Jewish Life Nov-Dec 1967 by Jewish Action

Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America is privileged to announce the WORLD CONFERENCE OF ASHKENAZI AND SEPHARDI SYNAGOGUES fiDJD t d

DID

to take place,

, in

JERUSALEM tm pn t j > on Teveth 7—12, 5728

January 8-13, 1968

First World Convocation in History of the Torah Synagogue

Further information in center pages.

REUNION WITH FAMILIES FROM RUSSIA Positive steps may now be taken to further the reunion of Soviet Jewish families with their relatives in the United States and other countries. As you may recall, the statement by USSR Premier Kosygin in December, 1966, that the Soviet Government would see to it that Soviet Jews who wanted to join their relatives living in the West “can be reunited with their families” is but further cor roboration of the broad humanitarian principle accepted by the Soviet Union and most nations. Full implementation of this principle by the Soviet Union would permit many Soviet Jews—tom and dispersed from their shattered families by the traumatic experiences of revolutions, World Wars, deportations, the Nazi holocaust—which set in mo tion vast waves of migration of peoples—to rejoin their families abroad. While false hopes must not be raised, Jews continue to leave the Soviet Union. United Hias Service, the worldwide Jewish migration agency, through its professional services, is prepared to advise on the specialized procedures to facilitate reunion of families. This may be an historic moment for many Jews in the Soviet Union and their families throughout the world. Jews in this country with relatives in the Soviet Union must take the initiative in extending an invitation to their relatives to join them. Unless such an invitation is extended, their relatives cannot request exit documents from the Soviet Government. In many instances American Jews may have lost contact with their relatives in the USSR. United Hias Service is in a position to assist families in locating their relatives in the Soviet Union. Details may be obtained from UNITED HIAS SERVICE 200 Park Avenue South, New York, N.Y. 10003 • Phone 674-6800

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Our readers will appreciate knowing that reprints are now available of the following articles and editorials from previous issues of JEW ISH LIFE. THE JEW ISH ATTITUDE TOW ARD FAM ILY PLANNING By Dr. Moses Tendler THE STATE O F THE JEW ISH S C H O O L IN A M ERICA By William Brlckman THE DIVORCE PROBLEM By Rabbi Melech Schachter THE JEW ISH-CHRIST1AN D IA LO G U E: AN OTH ER LO O K By Rabbi Norman Lamm CA N W E N EG LECT THE TALMUD TO R A H ? By Rabbi Zalman Diskind JUDAISM AND FREE ENQUIRY By Rabbi Nachum L. Rabinovitch THE PROBLEM O F CO N VERSIO N TODAY By Rabbi Melech Schachter NATURE— CREATION O R EVOLUTION ? By Robert Perlman JEW AND JEW , JE W AND N ON-JEW By Rabbi Aaron Soloveichik These reprints may be used to much advantage by study and discussion groups, as well as for distribution for public information purposes to people in your local areas. All reprints are 15 cents per copy; 10 cents per copy when 25 or more are ordered. Use order form below. Prepaid orders only, please

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a m

MICHAEL KAUFMAN, Financial Secretary of the Union of Ortho

dox Jewish Congregations of America, calls upon his journalistic experience in presenting to us a vivid portrait, physically and emo

tionally descriptive, of a visit behind the Iron Curtain. . . . In spite of the attention-drawing headlines from exotic news centers the world over, America’s youth keeps coming up for attention, some of it

our perhaps too late. RABBI AARON B. SEIDMAN, Director of the Hillel Foundation of George Washington University in Washing

c 0

ton, D.C., presents some pertinent points for consideration. . . . The Divine Commandments have been inspiration to generations of think ers in their quest to understand their beauty. In a scientific age, many

have essayed the scientific approach, not always with commendable

t results. DR. CARL N. KLAHR (Ph.D. in physics, Carnegie Institute

r of Technology), who is chairman of the College Program Committee of the Association of Orthodox Jewish Scientists, herein offers some 1

comments of greater inspiration. . . . In attempting to gain a better

b understanding of contemporary Orthodoxy, it is important to gather

u background and history, including appreciation of the pioneers. t

o r

RABBI AARON ROTHKOFF, spiritual leader of the Maplewood (New Jersey) Jewish Center, offers us once again an illuminating his tory of an illuminating figure.

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JEW ISH LIFE

Vol. XXXV, No. 2 / Nov.-Dec. 1967 / Kislev-Teveth 5728

l e w

i s h

ira

Is F

llle ARTICLES

Saul B ernstein , Editor R abbi S. J. S harfman L ibby K laperman P aul H. B aris

MODERN INTERPRETATION AND UNDERSTANDING OF THE MITZVOTH/Carl K la h r.......................................14

Editorial Associates

ON CHOOSING A COLLEGE AWAY FROM HOME/ Aaron B. Seidm an............................................................... 22

E lkanah Schwartz

THE MEITSHETER ILLUI/Aaron Rothkoff .....................29

Assistant Editor

VISIT TO RUSSIA/Michael Kaufman ...............................38 JEWISH LIFE is published bi-monthly. Subscription two years $4.50, three years $6.00, four years $7.50. Foreign: Add 40 cents per year. Editorial and Publication Office: 84 Fifth Avenue New York 10011, N. Y. ALgonquin 5-4100 Published, by U nion of O rthodox J ewish C ongregations of A merica J oseph K arasick

President H arold M. J acobs

BOOK REVIEWS THE GATES REVISITED/Jason Jacobowitz..................... 59 MODERN HISTORY, EARLY CHAPTER/ Louis Bernstein . . . .......................................................... 65 AGAIN, A SPOTLIGHT/Gilbert Klaperman ...................67

DEPARTMENTS CASES FROM THE RESPONSA LITERATURE/ David S. Shapiro .................

Chairman of the Board B e n ja m in K o e n ig s b e r g , Nathan K. Gross, David Politi, Dr. Bernard Lander, Harold H. Boxer, Vice Presi d e n t s ; M o r r is L. G r e e n , Treasurer; Dr. A. Abba Walker, Secretary; Michael Kaufman, Financial Secretary. Dr. Samson R, Weiss Executive Vice President Saul Bernstein, Administrator

AMONG OUR CONTRIBUTORS .......................................... 4 LETTERS TO THE EDITOR.................................................... 6

Cover and drawings on pages 28 and 35 by Naama Kitov Drawing on page 58 by David Adler

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November-December 1967

Letters to th e E d ito r Staten Island, New York Of late, a spate of articles and letters have appeared in JEWISH LIFE and elsewhere comparing Jewish law to the common law. While this is a very grati fying development for many reasons, a caveat hinted at in Rabbi Wein’s article (“Threading the Needle of Jewish Law,” July 1967) should be heavily stressed to avoid some unfortunate errors. The so-called criminal law of the Talmud as applied to a ben-Yisroel is wholly inappropriate to a present day penal sys tem. If directly applied, its leniency would result in a complete breakdown of law and order. Present-day penal laws are based in varying degrees on achieving three fundamental purposes: deterrence, retribution, and correction. Talmudic law, however, as applied to a ben-Yisroel, is unique in that its under lying purpose is in obtaining atonement (kaparah) for the defendant. It pre supposes a high morality on the part of the society to which it is applied (See Wein, p. 36). Furthermore, the concept of the court as referee between two contestants is not as applicable in Jewish law as in common law. In the former, the function of the court is deemed to be more of a teacher in

structing the litigants as to their duties rather than as an umpire in a contest Direct comparisons, therefore, may be very dangerous. Such an unfortunate comparison was made by Rabbi Norman Lamm who is mentioned by three letter-writers in the July-August issue as having conclusively shown in his celebrated discussion of the Fifth Amendment and Halochah which was cited by Chief Justice Warren in the Miranda case, (that) the Torah view and the Supreme Court are harmonious. Regrettably, that brilliant but unsound article failed to distinguish between a ben-Yisroel and a ben-Noach. In the case of the latter, as far as I can dis cover, a confession is admissable and may be sufficient to convict. (Sefer Hachinuch, Mitzva 28, 192; Medrash Rabbah (Noach) 34, 19; Yerushalmi, Kiddushin, Perek 1, Hal. 1.) After all, Miranda and Escobedo were bneiNoach! The current Supreme Court versus Public Prosecutor struggle is indeed complex. My own view, 'encapsulated, is that the Supreme Court in curbing JEW ISH LIFE

overzealous police and public prosecu What I clearly had in mind, in addi tors, is frustrating the moderates, so that tion to a comparative analysis for its all of them tend to abuse their remain own sake, was the suggestion that cer ing permissable powers. Procedure is tain profound insights of the Halochah stressed at the expense of substance. ought to be studied and adopted by Tensions rise and the interest of public American jurists. The legal concepts safety and accused innocents recede to considered by the Halochah as applic the background while the rules of the able to Israelites are, in our view as game become paramount: arrest pro traditional Jews, the product of divine cedures, warrants, searches, questioning, wisdom, and hence ought to be emulated etc., overshadow the issue of guilt or by all people. “For this is your wisdom innocence. and understanding in the sight of the The fault should be laid at the door peoples, that when they hear all these of the legislatures that have failed to lay statutes they shall say, ‘Surely this great down workable ground rules in this nation is a wise and understanding peo area, leaving it to the courts to legislate ple.’ ” (Deut. 4:6) Surely a proposal as abuses mount. The core problem of that American courts treat its citizens democracy today is in the failure of as bnei-Noach—in other words, as clegislatures to respond to the need for strangers in their own country—will not remedial legislation, and in reacting inspire admiration for the wisdom of only to crises. the statutes of Judaism. An “understand If divinely inspired Halochah is to ing people” will suggest that other na be offered as a guide in solving any of tions treat their citizens as Jewish law these problems, we must be meticulously demands that Israel act towards bneiaccurate in offering a realistic exposi Yisroel. Of course, Mr. Gross, in his tion of it instead of a sugary, sermonic, excessive literalism, may consider this inapposite and idealistic statement of its “a sugary, sermonic, inapposite, and rules. idealistic statement” of the rules of R euben E. G ross Halochah, but if this is the price one must pay for making the wisdom of RABBI LAMM REPLIES: Judaism available to the rest of man Mr. Gross has completely missed the kind, it is small indeed. point of my “unsound” essay on the Having said this about the major ele Fifth Amendment. I obviously did not ment in his criticism, may I point out advocate the complete substitution of that Mr. Gross’ assertions that confes the Halochah for the Constitution as sion by a ben-Noach is admissible “as the legal code of the United States; even far as I can discover,” is not quite that Israel has not yet adopted Halochah as its official law. Had I intended such certain. The references he cites are in far-fetched notions, Mr. Gross could deed discoverable in the Encyclopedia readily have pointed to the disqualifica Talmudit, vol. I, p. 256a. However, a tion of the Supreme Court Justices on bit more serious exploration (even in the grounds of their not being Jewish. the remainder of the same footnote con One could easily discover other such taining these references!) would have absurdities. yielded the further discovery that this November-December 1967

opinion is not unanimous. Thus, his reference to the Yerushalmi is valid only according to one of the two classi cal commentators, not the other. The reference to Bereshis Rabbah depends on which text one accepts (see Theodor’s notes in his edition). The Chinuch, it is true, considers confessions of a ben Noach valid; but the Meiri does not (see editor’s notes to Meiri on Sanhedrin 57b). Such too is the opinion of the author of Chamra Ve’chayei (to San. 57b). Furthermore, in the view of the late R. Meshulam Roth, Maimonides too disqualifies confessions by bnei Noach, see his Responsa Kol Mevasser, vol. II, no. 22, 3. RABBI SAMUEL TURK REPLIES: I agree with Mr. Reuben Gross’s ob servation that the Torah’s criminal law concerning an Israelite does not apply to a Noahide and that the equating of the two by Rabbi Lamm was not in order. I too pointed out in the rebuttal to my critics that to insinuate that American laws are or should be the same as those of the Torah borders on the naive. Washington, after all, is not Sinai. This need not prevent us, however, from making certain comparisons and analyzing the patterns of approach to wards crime taken by the Torah. Mr. Gross makes the valid assertion, which I too stressed in my article, namely, that the court procedures in criminal cases involving a Jewish person were heavily weighted in favor of the suspect and that they presupposed a high stand ard of morality in society as a whole. Because the non-Israelite community did not demand such a high standard, a Noahide was not entitled to the pro

tection of such criminal procedures. When morality declined in the Jewish community as well, the Torah enabled the courts and the executive to tem porarily suspend the statutory guaran tees which favored the criminal suspect. Such suspension was maintained until the rate of crime declined to normal proportions. The main point of my paper was that the Supreme Court was performing a disservice to the country in choosing to expand the constitutional rights of sus pected and even known criminals at a time when bloodshed and violence are so rampant and the streets are not safe for law-abiding citizens. I suggested that the Supreme Court would be wise to follow the Torah’s course in restricting rights in such dangerous times rather than expand them. I cannot agree, however, with Mr. Gross’s contention that the underlying purpose of Talmudic criminal law is to obtain atonement for the defendant. While the element of atonement was a factor in Jewish criminal law the factor of deterrence was equally important. The Torah says “And those which re main shall hear and fear, and shall henceforth commit no more any such evil in thy midst.’’ (Deuteronomy 19, 20). I also pointed out that one of the seven Noahide laws obligates the nonJewish society to properly punish those guilty of bloodshed and to adequately protect the lives of all people and their property. This the government owes us even according to the laws of the Torah. We are, therefore, in the right when we demand from our government laws which will not tie the hands of law enforcement officers and which help to make jungles of our cities. JEW ISH LIFE

&<záe¿ ¿nom tác By DAVID S. SHAPIRO

Prayer for an Apostate

(Meil Zedakah, No. 7) N Turkey, where Jews generally enjoyed freedom of religion, a grave misfortune befell a Jewish family in the city of Izmir (Smyrna) at the beginning of the eighteenth century. A member of this family left home with a small son, to forsake his ancestral faith for another (most likely Islam). An event of this kind was most unusual, as Jews in Turkey were seldom subjected to religious discrimination, and this occurrence must have stirred the community to its depths. (It is possible this act of apostasy was connected with the Sabbatian movement, still strong in Turkey as elsewhere.) A question arose in the community as to whether prayers should be recited for the return of the renegade to his faith, and a query was sent to a renowned rabbi in Bohemia, Jonah Landsofer (1678-1712). It is not clear why a rabbi in distant Bohemia was consulted, especially one so young, as Turkey abounded in great Talmudic authorities. Perhaps the matter was referred to Rabbi Landsofer among others. The fact that his counsel was sought attests to the great prestige he enjoyed as an outstanding Talmudist despite his youth.

ABBI Landsofer responded to the problem by first analyzing its nature: on what grounds may one question the right of pious Jews to pray for the repentance of a sinner? He pointed put thait two difficulties are

Novembpr-Pepember l?67

involved: first, whether such a prayer is prohibited as being a futile prayer (Berachot 54b),since man is granted free will to choose his path and his behavior is not controlled by G-d. Again, if G-d wishes to restore the apostate to grace, prayers are altogether superfluous. Unlike a supplication for one’s own advantage, a prayer for the repentance of a sinner does not redound to the benefit of the one who prays, but to the greater glory of G-d. This should then be left to G-d to do as He pleases. To resolve the problem, Rabbi Landsofer thought it necessary to ex amine the question of freedom of the will, pointing out that this freedom is not absolute. There are times when man is deprived of freedom, as in the case of Pharaoh whose heart He hardened (Exodus 7:3). There are times, on the other hand, when G-d prevents a man from sinning as in the case of Abimelech (Genesis 19:6). “The heart of kings is in the hands of the Lord (Prov. 2 1 :1).” The Almighty at times inflicts suffering upon an individual to direct him into repentance, thereby curtailing his freedom, or He may do so without inflicting suffering. If, when He finds it necessary, He hardens the heart of a man to deprive him of his free will, will He not, when necessary, affect his heart to lead him back to a good life? Has not G-d promised He would remove our heart of stone and give us a heart of flesh (Ez. 36:26), and that He would pour forth His spirit upon all mankind (Joel 3:1)? That there is no absolute uniformity in the relationship of G-d to the world, that at times He transforms the order of nature and permits man to exercise his freedom, while at other times He takes complete control of nature and of man’s behavior, is expressive of a mode of divine activity that should not puzzle us. It is true, however, that a person may pray for himself,as in our daily liturgy: “Bring us back, our Father, to Thy Torah and restore us to Thy service.” Through our expressing desire to return to Him, He opens before us the gates of repentance. Otherwise, how would we ever be able to over come the moral obstacles that constantly face us? Moses did not entreat G-d to give the people a good heart to serve Him at all times but rather left it to them (Avodah Zarah 5a), suggesting that when a man’s conscience is not aroused, praying for him is futile. Another passage in the Talmud, ascribing the greater efficacy of prayers for rain to the virtue of the wife of Abba Hilkiah rather than to her husband, because she pleaded with G-d for the repentance of the wicked while he prayed for their death (Taanith 23b), also fails to serve as evidence for our problem. Perhaps the wicked men referred to there were, as Rashi says, only ignorant men (The Hebrew “baryonim” is elsewhere explained differently by Rashi) and for such men we are permitted to pray because they are akin to sick people. It is also pos sible that the unique virtue of the wife of Abba Hilkiah was unique devotion to charity rather than prayers for the wicked. The evidence from this passage is thus not conclusive. The statement of Rabbi Meir’s wife Beruriah, that it is preferable for him to pray for the wicked men tormenting him rather than for their death IQ

JEW ISH U FE

(Berachot 10a) is likewise not decisive. Her intention might have been that his prayer for their repentance would cause them to cease harassing him and for this reason she herself did not supplicate for their rehabilitation but asked her husband to pray that G-d keep them from this particular sin, as when the men of the Great Assembly prayed for the destruction of the evil impulse of idolatry. One cannot ask G-d to deprive an individual com pletely of his freedom to choose between good and evil. Since Rabbi Meir’s own welfare was at stake, perhaps he would have been able to expand the scope of the prayer to include the complete repentance of his tormentors. Similarly, the counsel by Rabbi Isaac Luria to a sage whose son had become an apostate to offer special prayers for his full repentance might have referred to a situation where the son was regretting his apostasy and the father’s prayer provided additional support. Moreover, a father certainly has the right to pray for his son, as the departure of the son from the faith causes great agony to the father. Rabbi Landsofer concludes that where a child who cannot repent on his own is involved, as in the case under discussion, we must all regard ourselves as guardians and it becomes our duty to pray for him. And since the child cannot repent except through the father, it becomes our duty to include both in our prayers. HE collection of prayers “Shaare Zedek” contains a petition for the return of unbelievers. This prayer is also justified because it is inconceiv able that some thought of repentance does not pass through their minds. We beseech G-d to open the gates of repentance for those who already in their hearts have a desire to repent. “He who wishes to purify himself re ceives help from on high” (Yoma 38b). The prayer that G-d exterminate idolatry and restore the hearts of the idolaters to worship Him (Berachot 57b) has no bearing on the problem of free will. Since we pray for the elimination of idolatry, the idol-worshippers will of their own accord return to G-d. Moreover, the majority are devoted to their false religions not of their own free will but because of their train ing, and it is for these misguided souls that we pray they be restored to their free will to choose the truth. The Scriptures also tell us that Moses prayed for sinners (see Sotah 14a). This was proper because every sinner entertains thoughts of repent ance. This makes it permissible and even obligatory for righteous men to beseech G-d for the return of the wicked. It is thus clarified that it is permissible to pray for the wicked and these prayers are neither in vain nor an infringement upon the concept of freedom. The transient thought of repentance in the heart of the sinner gives us the right to plead that G-d open for him in full the gates of repentance.

November-December 1967

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Modern Interpretation and Understanding of the Mitzvoth By CARL KLAHR

HEN one speaks of interpreting Furthermore, it is a logical one, in a or understanding the Mitzvoth, relationship between finite human be W the first reaction of the observant Jew ings and an infinite G-d Who is be is apt to be one of alarm. Are we not the nation of na’aseh ve-nishma, of “performance before understanding”? Isn’t it a fact that such “explanations” are used by our detractors, to belittle and ridicule the incredible stubborn ness of the Jewish people in perpetu ating the Mitzvoth? * These ancient rituals, say our detractors, are prac tices which may have had some use fulness in ancient times, but not to day. The attitude of the orthodox Jew today is often to refuse to think about reasons for the Mitzvoth (Ta’amey Hamitzvoth) or about reasons for in terpreting them. These are the de crees of our King which we accept with blind loyalty. Let me emphasize that this com mitment to performance before un derstanding must indeed be the very essence and basis of our attitude. * The Hebrew word “mitzvah” can be vari ously translated as “commandment,” “law,” or “attachment.” The 613 mitzvoth are G-d-given commands by means of which we attach our selves to G-d Who is beyond our senses and intellect.

yond our understanding. Nevertheless, it should also be emphasized that, beyond this basic attitude, the inter pretation and understanding of the Mitzvoth is an integral part of Jewish tradition. It is part of the command ment of learning the Torah and we can no more cut off our attempts to understand the Mitzvoth, in the con text of all the other rational and logical processes of our lives, than we can cut out any other subject from Torah learning. This viewpoint is ex pressed in the essay by Dayan Grunfeld in the Soncino Press edition of Samson Raphael Hirsch’s “Horev” ; the essay, entitled “The Duty of Ex plaining the Mitzvos,” cites numerous statements from the Talmud and from our Sages of all eras expressing this point of view. Let me quote a few. In Pesachim (119a) the Talmud promises reward to him “who un covers the things which the Almighty concealed—namely the reasons for the Mitzvoth.” This passage not only JEW ISH LIFE

permits penetration into the con cealed motives of the law but con siders such thought and research praiseworthy. The Rambam writes, in the Mishneh Torah: “It behooves man to meditate on the laws of our Holy Torah and to know the deeper meaning as much as lies in his power. This sacred duty to meditate on the laws of G-d for their deeper reasons, as far as our limited human intellect permits us, includes even the Chukim, the seemingly un-rational laws.” Maimonides here stresses the fact that the Mitzvoth have a deep meaning for our human understanding, for otherwise they would not have been given to man. Even such seemingly un-rational commandments as Shaatnez, the prohibition against wearing linen and wool together, and the pro hibition against eating milk and meat together, are of the greatest signific ance for the character and welfare of man, and have purposes which should be sought out. One could mention many of our other great sages who made Ta’amey Hamitzvoth an important part of their Torah study. These include Rabbi Yehudah Halevi, the author of the “Chinuch,” the Rambam, the Rekanti, the Zohar (which abounds in Kabbalistic interpretations of the Mitzvoth) and in the recent past era such great men as Rabbi Samson Raphael Hirsch and the Malbim. These studies in clude even the reasons for the Korbonoth (the sacrificial offerings), for the Ketoreth (the incense offering), and for the detailed description of the Holy Temple (the Beth Hamikdosh). In this connection let me mention the Torath Ha-Olah by Rabbi Moses Isserles (the Ramah) of Shulchon Oruch fame, and the splendid essay by the Malbim, entitled “Ramzey November-December 1967

Hamishkon,” on the significance of the Holy Temple. The Malbim, by the way, also has a wonderful essay ex plaining the significance of the porah adumah, the ashes of the red heifer. HY has Jewish tradition, why have our great men, worked so extensively on the seemingly imprac tical topic of understanding the Mitz voth? One can answer simply that this too is a part of Torah and there fore it must be studied. However, there are a number of practical and rational reasons why interpreting the Commandments is a necessity: First and foremost is the ethical and educational reason. In order to effectuate the spiritual force of the laws in the lives of those who ob serve them, they must understand, to some extent, some of their meaning and significance. Each, however, must be enabled to perceive the Mitzvoth in his own terms and in his own cultural context. A reason that satis fies a man today is not necessarily a reason that would have been satis fying in Talmudic times or in the Middle Ages, but we all need some reason. We are human, and being human, we are to an extent rational and require logic and understanding to supplement faith in motivating our actions. Our actions and observances come from the mind as well as from the emotions, and the mind requires reason and rational intellect. We have only to look around us to find many to whom the religious observances have become little more than habituated customs. The Talmud calls this mitzvoth melumadoth— “habit Judaism.” Such Jews may be very scrupulous in the details of the Mitzvoth Ma’asiyoth, the “practical” observances, but for them there is

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little connection between these *Mitz pose and the act or deed which it is voth and the growth and ennoblement to explain is drawn from our own of their own personalities. The fulfill limited human experience. We think ment of the Mitzvoth Ma’asiyoth of a single reason as the motive for must lead to fulfillment of the Mitz the act. A human reason or purpose voth of moral and ethical conduct may be unique, it may be one-to-one and spiritual elevation, to humility, to with the action. Often, however, even selflessness, to personal honesty, to on the human level, there is a manydedication to the cause of the Jewish to-one correspondence between the people, to the purposes of the Lord. reasons for an action and the doing The Mitzvoth of this category are no of the act. A sophisticated human be less mandatory, no less primary, than ing can have many reasons, many those of the other. Not seldom, how purposes in mind, for doing a specific ever, do we find one-sided Mitzvah act or for wanting that it be done. observance leading to narrowness, to Obviously, then, an infinite G-d exclusiveness, to status Judaism, and would not be expected to have single to a holier-than-thou attitude. reasons for the actions that He wants The remedy for mitzvoth melum- carried out. One would not expect a adoth is thought and understanding of one-to-one correspondence between the purposes of the Mitzvoth—of His purpose and the Mitzvah, one what, insofar as mortals can fathom, would rather expect a multiplicity of the Divine commands were ordained reasons; actually one might surmise to achieve among us. Thus, Ta’amey that the correspondence is infinity-toHamitzvoth are extremely important, one between His reasons and purposes in this day and age particularly, for and the actions—Mitzvoth—which our ethical and moral education. It He ordains to be performed. One can lead to the personality develop would therefore not expect single rea ment, to the broadness of view, to the sons for each Mitzvah but rather a sense of dedication, and to the appre boundless multiplicity of purposes or ciation of our fellow man, that makes reasons for each. Rashi, in commenting on the phrase the observance of the Torah a lifegiving potion, som hachoCim, instead “which the Lord caused to happen of a dulling drug, som hamoveth. In to him” in the Sidrah Mishpotim, short, I believe that the performance quotes the comments of the Talmud of the Mitzvoth, all the Mitzvoth, on a very profound basic belief of must be accompanied with a sufficient Judaism. It concerns the role of the “feel” for their earthly purpose and Lord in “pulling the strings” behind objectives if they are to do for us all human relationships. In our own language, he says, we should think of what the Lord wants done. G-d as the solver of the huge num %V7 E should never, however, make ber of simultaneous equations in in ▼▼ the mistake of thinking that terpersonal affairs. Thus the familiar our reason or our understanding of a story of the two murderers who met Mitzvah is the single reason or the in an inn: One deserved exile and exclusive purpose. one deserved execution but the ab The concept of a one-to-one cor sence of witnesses made these sen respondence between a reason or pur- tences impossible. It then transpires

JEWISH UFi

that the Judge of all causes the one deserving exile to accidentally kill the one deserving execution, in the pres ence of witnesses. Then the courts can carry out their function. Thus this particular equation is solved. We can therefore think of G-d as the solver of our simultaneous equa tions. All the universe is before Him, and all interactions are arranged to accomplish His purposes for each being, in every aspect of being. Since G-d solves and balances all the simul taneous equations of human interac tion, we cannot attribute unique rea sons to Him because He has number less reasons for His selected actions. This applies to the Mitzvoth in par ticular, as the special actions and activities which the Lord desires from us. HILE it is meaningless to talk of sole reasons for the Mitz voth, it should be emphasized that this does not deny the validity of any single reason or group of reasons which are rational and meaningful within the Torah frame of reference. A “reason” for a Mitzvah is simply a way of understanding it. It may vary from individual to individual, from one historical period to another, from one culture to another. It need only be, within the terms of the Torah totality, rational, objective and not subjective, and meaningful. It can make illuminating sense to us, with out the egotism of assuming that it is unique. We recognize how diverse human personalities are. It should not surprise us that G-d’s purposes, the reasons for the Mitzvoth, are diverse beyond human comprehension.

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OW we come to the question of substance: what types of reasons have been given for the Mitzvoth by

November-December 1967

the many streams of opinion within Jewish tradition which we have pointed out? What is the nature of the reasons and purposes which have been given by our Torah scholars? Viewing the various opinions in perspective, one finds a rather sur prising unity, in view of the diversity of reasons which one might expect. The following general conclusions offer themselves: 1. The number of different types of explanations of general categories of purposes for the Mitzvoth is limited, perhaps six or seven in all. 2. Some of the explanations gener ated within the Torah tradition might almost have come from mod ern anthropologists, sociologists, and psychologists. But these pur poses and reasons which our Tradi tion has advanced, have the ethical and idealistic character of being G-d-given ( Torah min Hashomayim) in sharp contrast to the na turalistic point of view. 3. A good case can be made that the differences between these six or seven types of reasons are seman tic, rather than real; they are really different levels of explanation which fit together. They are not in trinsically different purposes which conflict with each other. The dif ferences seem to be attributable to differences in language, terminol ogy, and above all, to differences in problem areas, not to differences in their essentials. 4. When one studies these explana tions for the Mitzvoth, it becomes apparent that they are increasingly understandable today, because the concepts and terminology of our scientific culture can be applied to expanding the levels detailed in the explanations given. 17

NE can list the following general categories of reasons for the Mitzvoth and mention some of their leading exponents.

Reason 1. E lim in a tio n of savage and primitive practices. This includes idol worship, animism, superstition, and primitive conceptions of G-d. The Rambam em phasized such reasons in his Guide of the Perplex ed, with particular atten tion to their historic neces sity in certain periods. However, it should be re membered that we are all primitives and savages in our earlier years, and some of us never entirely get over it. Reason 2. Development of a well ordered and healthy so ciety, including the main tenance of what Rousseau called “the social contract-’ —honesty, stability, moral ity. The author of the Chinuch as well as the Rambam emphasized such explanations. Reason 3. Maintenance of one’s health of mind and body, including such purposes as physical health, modera tion, self-control, absence of cruelty. Reason 4. National and spiritual per petuation of the Jewish people, including mainten ance of Jewish separatism, in order to preserve Israel as bearer of a unique, focal mission. There is an argument of historical necessity here too. 18

Reason 5. Development of the per sonality and character of the individual and devel opment of the personality of the Jewish people. This is the reason given in the Talmud by Rav: “The Mitzvoth were given pri marily to refine and en noble the character of mankind.” This is a very fundamental principle. It refers to the direct effects of Torah fulfillment upon the personality of him who fulfills it. Reason 6. Symbolic effects upon the personality and upon the group. This reason refers to indirect effects of the Mitzvoth upon the fulfiller through ideas and atti tudes symbolically express ed in their observance. This type of explanation was emphasized by Sam son Raphael Hirsch and his school of thought. Reason 7. Mystical reasons. This con cerns the effect of the per formance of the Mitzvah on the spiritual “superworlds’’ above us—and through them to direct ef fects on this material world in which we exist. There is an extensive theo retical literature, terminoM ogy, and language involv ed here, the field of mysti cism embraced in Kabbolah and Chassidic philoso phy. These reasons range from the so ciological and anthropological to ex planations involving individual psy chology and finally to mysticism. What JEW ISH LIFE

is the unifying feature of these diverse purposes?

bols on the development and refinement of charac ter.

N examination of the purpose descriptions given in religious literature discloses, as previously in dicated, that they are all different ways of expressing the same thing in different languages, at different levels of explanation, and in different ter minologies, each conceived with its own immediate problem areas. Here, let us consider the several types of explanations in relation to the abovecited Reason 5, which is the state ment by Rav in the Talmud that the purpose of the Mitzvoth is to refine the personality and character of the individual. Reason 1. Elimination of savage and primitive practiced. This is clearly a special case of refinement of personality and character. Reason 2. Development of a well or dered society. This is clearly a necessary condi tion for individual refine ment. Reason 3. Maintenance of the in dividual’s health of mind and body. This is also a necessary condition. Reason 4. National and spiritual per petuation of the Jewish people, as the unique bear er of Torah. This is a necessary condition for the perpetuation and intellec tual propagation of the refinement ideals of the Torah. Reason 6. Symbolic effects upon the personality. It was the ob jective of Rabbi S. R. Hirsch to show the effects of the Mitzvoth as sym-

EVERAL recent concepts of psy chology, I believe, can be par ticularly meaningful in furthering our understanding of such symbolic effects of the Mitzvoth. The concept of the unconscious mind is one which clari fies the role of the symbolic effects of the Mitzvoth. The Talmud often uses the following expression in this connection: “Even when a man can not see a reason, his (unconscious) mind can see.” This means that there can be strong effects on the personal ity without the individual consciously realizing it. The concept of the uni versal meaning of symbols is another recent one which may be useful in understanding the symbolic effects of the Mitzvoth. The use of semantic analysis of speech is another recent concept: it emphasizes the vast ar ray of connotation and suggestions brought up by a word or a symbol. What a Mitzvah can accomplish is the broadening of the individual— broadening his identification, through intellectual and emotional means, through both his conscious mind and his unconscious mind. This includes his identification with his family, with his community, with the Jewish peo ple, with the world, and through all these with the purposes of the Lord. One mechanism for this is through the symbolism of the Mitzvah. But we know that a symbol is more than a sign. It triggers a whole personality pattern. The symbols to the uncon scious mind are real things derived from our childhood and from the totality of civilized culture patterns— perhaps even from a collective un conscious.

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November-December 1967

INALLY, we consider Reasoh 7, the mystical explanation for the Mitzvoth. The Kabbalists say that when a Jew performs a Mitzvah he changes the world from the highest heavens to this mundane world of clay. We can understand this rationally if we only add: he changes the world by first changing himself. Being himself changed, his interactions with all other things in the world have changed, hence his doing the Mitzvah has changed the world. There is some difficulty in inter preting these mystical reasons be cause the Kabbalists speak in a rather specialized terminology, e.g., of an gels as G-dly attributes and powers, and of spiritual superworlds as higher levels of experience of the Divine essence. How can one interpret this termin ology in our own rational language? By considering the effect of the in dividual on the world, and of the re finement of the individual personality and its identification with the world outside himself. For example, when the Kabbalists speak of angels, one can interpret this in terms of its ef fects on the individual, e.g., of an individual rededicated, re-inspired, able at the critical moment to per form the action, or make the free choice, which can affect the world. This changes the world through the complicated interactions which con nect all men, and all phenomena, to gether. Such rational interpretations of Kabbalistic concepts are not new ideas. Zeitlin in his book, “Yesodoth Ha-chasiduth Ve-ha-kabolah,” points out that the basic human service of the Lord in the terms of the Kabbal ists is done not by mystical experi-

ences but by rationalization and un derstanding. Thus we have the equivalence of the various types of reasons for the Mitzvoth. Although their languages vary from sociology to psychology to nationalism to mysticism, the essen tial idea is the same: the Mitzvah, the G-d-Divine command, is a mechanism for the elevation, refine ment, and broadening of the human personality, to bring it to its ultimate levels of identification with our peo ple, with the world, and with G-d. rp U R N IN G from the general to the A particular, we can, I believe, un derstand the Mitzvoth individually in this same way. As an example let us consider two very difficult categories: 1) ritual uncleanliness (Tumah) and 2) the sacrificial offerings (Korbonoth). Can one really give rational ex planations for such Chukim, seeming ly unrational Mitzvoth? Drawing upon the explanation of Hirsch, it can be said that ritual uncleanliness is the effect on the individual— on both his conscious and unconscious mind—of loss of control, of loss of freedom of choice, in three major areas of life: death, sex, and the emo tion of hate in which the individual sees loss of freedom of personal choice. With regard to the sacrificial offer ings, a number of commentators point out their functional chain, go ing from a symbolic act to its effect on the individual and through the effects on the individual its effects on the world at large. One must also realize that one answer to the question: What is the reason or purpose for any Mitzvah?, can be obtained by asking the operaJEW ISH LIFE

tional question: What are the effects on the individual of performing the Mitzvah? Thus with Sha’atnez—inter mixture of linen and wool—for ex ample, one effect is this: even in his purchase of clothing a Jew thinks of G-d’s will. Thus one carries out the principle enunciated by King Solo mon in Proverbs: “In all your ways know Him.” ECAUSE Western society is in dividual-oriented, the basic cri terion today, in thinking of Mitzvah purpose, is, “What can it do for me?”. Perhaps we should also look at the values of other societies which have been more group-oriented, whose basic criterion would be: “What does the Mitzvah do for the Jewish com munity?” In such a context the social or sociological answers are equally pertinent with those directed towards the individual. I would like to emphasise that crea tive thinking in these areas is possi ble, now as never before. We have certain rational intellectual equip ment for such understanding that was not available in the past. But crea tive thinking on Ta’amey Hamitzvoth must be done in a disciplined way, under the complete influence of our tradition and steeped in our beliefs. This is one face of Torah and a very important face. It can have largescale impact on the understanding of believing and observing Jews and on that of the culturally and religiously lost Jews of this age. It can also have important consequences on our own faith, enthusiasm, and personal ac tions.

November-December 1967

T U S T as mental processes alone are i f insufficient in the building of character, since they do not focus the entire personality, so is habituated performance alone ineffective. Both are necessary. Performance of the Mitzvoth without a feel and under standing for their purpose and with out constant introspection is like a body without a soul. Performance is more important, for in this world there can be no soul without a body, but rote performance, without study, introspection, understanding, and per sonal application, is only a shell. This is why understanding the Mitzvoth is so important. This is why the reasons for the Mitzvoth— al though at best these will be incom plete and only vaguely defined—must be studied, I believe, in a serious and formal manner. Self-improvement is not mere self chastisement. It must be an intellec tual exercise as well, in which we enhance our understanding of our selves, our compassion for others, and our appreciation of the personality effects of Mitzvah fulfillment. This intellectual exercise must be perform ed in relation to the goal of person ality and character development, of character refinement, and of broad ening of identifications. This is Torah. Given the duality of the body plus soul, it requires the active participa tion and partnership of the mind. Judaism is concerned with main taining the delicate balance between the individual’s performance (his deeds) and his understanding. There are dangers of extremism on each side. The balance is a delicate one.

On Choosing A College Away from Home By AARON B. SEIDMAN

ROM the moment the emerging and still hesitant teenager begins to plan on higher education, he and his or her parents sense a change of roles. When the family unit begins to consider the choice of a college, the student, expressly or in an implied manner, is given a more prominent position. The parents, fearful of re bellion, advise discreetly and consult on such questions as location, status, and—sometimes — religious matters. However, what is often overlooked is that this embarkation on a decision making academic venture sets in mo tion a series of vital lifetime factors. The student, sensing adult uncer tainty, begins to flex his right of selfdetermination, perhaps for the first time, and to assert himself in vary ing degrees. And while this in itself is not an unwanted quality, it will bring into focus the sum total train ing of the student’s background, his latent desires and suppressed antagon isms. He will then select for em phasis, using the choice of a school as a lever, specified areas that may severely jar many precious parentstandards.

The skirmishing generally begins with the question of a local college or junior college as against an out-oftown college. Frequently, the argu ment of the high school senior and some of his academic advisors is that the experience of stretching and even severing the umbilical ties by going off to distant pastures is an infallible means of attaining maturity. In this respect, a valid counter-contention is that the young person mature enough to be sent to college does not have to go away to prove it and the one not mature enough should not. /" ^ OING to school far from home v J has acquired an aura of glamour and seems to beckon with many at tractions. The high school counselor, beset by numerous requests, is never so professional as when he is riffling the pages of a catalog of some far away institution of learning. At times, he fails to consider the background and particular requirements of the in dividual student and advises him in broad generalizations. Some of the difficulty arises in the indiscriminate application to out-ofJEW ISH LIFE

town schools merely because they are where they are, because it is “the thing to do,” or because it gives a better impression when you can say, “my children are away at college.” At other times, special family con siderations and the inability of getting along at home are the reasons for transferring to distant halls of ivy. In those instances the area of intent and effectiveness is difficult to gauge. The decision to leave home is thus quite complicated and its justification problematical. There is, of course, the student who will seek a university away from the parental environs for good and valid reasons. The university of his choice may specialize in a particular field of his interest. He may be from a section of the country where the calibre of the academic institutions is not the best or where there are none. Further, the more mature student may find it necessary to journey out of town to advance his professional

goals. However, in many cases, the reverse is true—the home area has better-rated schools than the “grass is greener” schools away. Often this baccalaureate quest over the horizon is the symptom of a ten dency to reject the values of the home. The ethical standards of the family are subtly, and many times not so subtly, underscored by means of proximity, and parental concern has greater persuasion in situations where it can be applied immediately, not when it is too late. It is true that morality or its absence can be mani fested under parental aegis as well as away from it. However, it is un deniable that the degree of concern and restraint is more effective in con ditions of closeness. Furthermore, the student who chooses to be near home, generally, is not fearful of his indi viduality, nor does he need to pro claim it by escaping from home and the moral values transmitted to him*

THE M O RALITY O F A FREE C H O IC E

r i i H E DEGREE of interest in ethii cal behaviour is an inseparable factor in the choice qf a place for the critical growth of the student. It affects the student directly and is one of the intangible inevitables that fashion his image. To understand this interaction between selection and sen sitivity more fully, consider these trends in student migration and the pattern of colleges Jewish students choose in a study entitled “A Statis tical and Historical Survey of Jewish November-December 1967

Students.”* From these figures, some preliminary theories can be made concerning the framework of the choice of a college and the develop ment of student ethics. The study cites the forecast of the Office of Education of the Depart ment of Health, Education and Wel fare, which predicts a general college enrollment of 8,677,900 in 1975 as compared with 4,988,000 in 1964. * Josep Alfred: Washington, D.C.: Brith Hillel Foundation, 1963.

Bnai

The study includes figures on the Jewish student population from other sources. These show that of 275,000 Jewish college-agfe youth in 1963, 82.2% are estimated to be in college as compared with 62% of those in the proper age brackets in 1955. Along with the increase in num*| bers, there was a considerable shift in the geographic distribution of the Jewish students. The most significant change occurred in New York City. In 1935, 53% of all Jewish college students in the United States attended colleges in New York City, but this dropped to 50% in 1946 and to 38% in 1955. By 1963 the overall Jewish student enrollment in colleges in New York City was estimated as 76,000, which is only 27.6% of all the Jew ish students in the United States. Tentative reasons for these devel opments, according to the study, are attributable to the rapid rise of the Jewish group into the middle class where “more parents are able to give their children a college education, in cluding an education away from home.” Some weight is given to the New York State University system which siphoned many students from the metropolitan area, and another possibility is the liberalization of ad missions policies in many universities. HAT these figures omit and can not be expected to predict is that the pendulum is slowly but definitely swinging in the opposite direction as of 1967, and for very sound reasons. There is a perceptible sentiment among some students that their parents are rejecting them by sending them away. Students who

have been studying out of town are transferring back home. This can be ascribed to a better study atmosphere in the home area, to the constriction of dormitory life, to the superfluous consumption of time by the daily mechanics of life, taken for granted at home, and to the limitations of finances. There is also an increasing willingness by the more mature stu dent to face the reality that not al ways are the imagined utopias better geared academically, socially, or religiously. However, many students and their parents who still run out of town have second thoughts, each for rea sons of their own. The questions of capability, religion, and morality sud denly loom large when the registra tion form is filled out and the deposit is put in the mail. “Will I make it?” “What about the stories we hear?” “Can I adjust to the studying?” “Is there a Yavneh chapter, or at least a Hillel, on campus?” These and similar questions are of ten the occasion for a flying trip to the university. A journey for quick reassurance and information is note worthy but an analysis of one’s own motives is even more illuminating. The cultural and socio-economic level of both the student and the parents will be reflected in the type of school that can be afforded and that is gen erally chosen. This interaction is logically seen when objectively viewed. In the selec tion of a school, no amount of visits or research can really discover the true nature of all the aspects of the school, or how the student will react. What remains is that the choice is JEW ISH LIFE

mainly socially and sometimes in stinctively made. With this in mind the ethical foundations and direction

of such a university microcosm must be evaluated and traced as far as possible.

PRICE AND VALUE

HE values that emerge on a given campus are, in large measure, a distillation and variation on the ideals, objectives, and attainments of the adult environment, transmitted through the students. Add to this an admixture of reversal and rebellion in varying degrees and you can per ceive a world different but yet not indistinguishable from the adult world. The underlying problem is that of adjusting to the relative affluence which has touched that segment of the population from which students throughout the land are drawn. Whereas this materialistic strain is a somewhat anticipated development, and a restatement of the phenomenon that these generations are not like past generations, this heady strain of a modicum of wealth is still too new to be used with a sense of balance. It controls where it should be con trolled. The leavening of a little money has become a dangerous thing. This is not only observed in such matters as flashy convertibles, expensive clothes* .! and misdirected largesse, but in the very choice of a college and the development of the moral climate in the dormitories, fraternities, sororities, and student centers. While there still may be a glim mering of the thirst for learning it self in the Jewish parent and less in his offspring, the stress is more on

November-December 1967

academic vocation than on academic convocation. This is a direct result of the normal desire to maintain economic stability and security. How ever, where vocational materialism played a somewhat secondary role with their parents because of an overriding memory of the value of study as a means of religious expres sion, their children removed by sev eral generations from the source of this memory no longer respond to its guidance or partial influence. Parents often only become con cerned by this emphasis on material ism and expediency when it leads to an undermining of religious traditions and observance, but especially when it emerges as violation of their out wardly espoused principles by inter marriage. They fail to understand that the forces which impelled them or their forebears to a new land were in some, measure a reaction to the established forms and this attitude is mirrored and magnified by their chil dren. The adult world rejected some parts of its heritage and feels that it went far enough, but the student dis agrees and carries it a step further. Therefore what seemed like a speck of light in adult eyes appears as a beam when viewed by their Offspring. N many instances, these students, scions of dissent, run to faraway schools to increase the distance in values. They form the majority “peer

groups” in various colleges and in fluence students from marginal and even traditional homes. This situation deserves careful consideration by all the parties in the fateful academic choice. However, even these atmos pheric disturbances are interwoven with diverse elements of a search for values, as is evidenced by the attrac tion of students to the Peace Corps, Sheruth La’am, and other service projects. This quest for abiding values is not an innovation. Every generation re quires foundations and direction, and

looks toward philosophical and theol ogical precepts for guidance. It is only the manner of attainment that differs from ode period to the next. There are times when we may doubt the existence of such a quest in the present generation of youth, but it is there directly and indirectly. The present approach is visible in an am bivalence to particular events, and a trend can be discerned. The points of reference include student attitudes to religion, moral standards, toler ance, prejudice, and social conscious ness.

THE T O U C H STO N ES O F M ORALITY

HE RESULTS of some studies made of student responses to re ligion indicate that students usually express a need for religion, but that it does not carry over to guide nnd direct important decisions in every day life (“Changing Values in C o t lege,” p. 2). * The popular notion of total secularization is not as total in theory as may have been assumed. The forms of religion are still ob served. Thus “for every student who stated that he personally valued re ligion less since he came to college, there were two who had come to value religion more . . .” (p. 55.) This is also accompanied by a liber alization of belief and a less, restric tive attitude as he proceeds through college, without diminishing his faith (p. 56.). Religion is by far the most secure basis and motivation for the adoption

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* Jacob, Philip E.; New York: Harper Broth ers, 1957.

of rules of conduct. When moral standards are considered apart from religion, they lack the strength of a tradition and subject themselves to the prospect of abrupt or eroding de struction. In college, therefore, having established the premise of religious interest, even on a perfunctory level, it follows that the usually accepted norms are generally accepted. How ever, one study showed that 66% of students interviewed would not report a case of cheating where a personal friend was involved. Other instances reported in the newspapers indicate that academic honesty in our highly competitive society is expendable and the sad fact is that cheating and other cutting of moral corners are present in more instances than we are willing to admit. But although consistency is bent in this regard, the forms exist and there is hope that in some the sense of moral principle is not erased. Where sincerity, reliability and JEW ISH LIFE

honesty can possibly be accepted as abstract ideals, the matter of the moment is put to the test when it comes to sexual permissiveness. The attitude surveys on these questions, interestingly enough, indicate that “. . . a strong tendency towards orth odoxy characterizes the students’ ethical systems, despite the ‘boldness’ of college talk, dress, and outward social conduct.” They also ascertained that many students are inclined to tolerate behaviour on the part of others which they might not approve for themselves. The factors that lead to premarital relations include per sonal inadequacy, family background, and the peer group. In addition, cer tain universities, for socio-economic reasons, have garnered a reputation for laxity. The school bears the re sponsibility of establishing standards and maintaining them, but it is wary of being called a surrogate-parent and intolerant in view of the “ new” freedom, HIS tolerance of personal habits in others carries over to matters of prejudice and political franchise. Aside from a minority of southern

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sectional college opinion which up holds the color bar and subscribes to intolerance to other groups, Ameri can students are generally tolerant of people of different national origins. Furthermore, the Cornell Survey and Inventory of Beliefs confirms the view that students become progressively less prejudiced at college. (“Chang ing Values . . .” pp. 29, 47) This attitude is the basis for the academic support of the range of civil rights when civilly requested. From acceptance to action is a large step. Militant dedication to these ideas is nevertheless confined to a limited number of students. The larg er student body may sympathize but they tend to remove themselves from the social and political arenas. Value studies of college and graduate stu dents show that American students speak of and accept the values of popular democracy, but are too pre occupied with their own immediate problems to allow much time for poli tical participation. Thus they state that they do not consider writing to their legislators a waste of time, but very few do it. (“Changing Values . | . ..” P. 25.)

C O N C LU S IO N S AND DECISIO NS

T J 7 HAT this resume of ethical and ▼▼ moral reactions purports to com ment upon is a similarity among the young people who attend the univer sities of the land. College clarifies but does not necessarily nullify traditional ethical and moral standards, provided they are an integral part of the stu dent’s being. They bring with them, to the various institutions, a set of November-December 1967

tendencies if not tenets, and college adds some finesse and encourages thinking in universal terms, and re quires personal application of these principles. But the question remains as to what was brought from home, how strong is the individual student and how much can he withstand. Therefore, in any given situation, the known factors of dissent and the 27

press of uniformity to accept the dif ferent must be exactingly weighed. Further there must be a careful in dividual evaluation of the possible conflict between the values of the home environment and those of the seemingly inviolate academic pro nouncements. The problem is gaug ing the extent of the effect of faculty, students, and administration on mat uration without the counter-balance of the religious, emotional, and ex perience-proven values of the home in close proximity. What also becomes clear from these brief inquiries is the great amount of indecision in the minds of many students. They are groping for answers and need the even effect of a home environment even when they rail against it. Instead, the path of least resistance is essayed, and they are hustled off to school, the choice of which is often too hastily made and ending up with unanticipated results.

r p iH E intelligent family unit deeid-I- ing on a college away from home must survey the possibilities and pitfalls of the moral, religious, and academic atmosphere in the potential school. Although students cannot be shielded indefinitely, it is also far from wisdom to cast fof a college without caution and select the remote institution when the school nearby may be superior academically, and the moral suasion of the home is sounder than the doubtful experiment of some dormitory life and its in fluences. And so when the question of a proper choice presents itself, we should remember the words of the prayer asking the Almighty as a grac ious Parent to infuse our hearts with understanding, with wisdom, with the ability to perceive, to perform and to fulfill all the words of instruction in the Torah, the Divine norm of all ethics that ennoble mankind.

JEW ISH LIFE

The 'Meitsheter lllui' By AARON ROTHKOFF

Maharshah, and Maharam, but his

EPTEMBER 1, 1922, should be S recorded in the annals of Ameri photographic memory retained every can Orthodoxy as the day on which concept that he mastered in his week the first great European Rosh Yeshivah arrived in the United States solely for the purpose of disseminat ing Torah on the American scene. The world famous “Meitsheter lllui,” Rabbi Shelomoh Polachek, disem barked that day to assume his duties as the Rosh Ha-Yeshivah of the Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary. He was born in 1877 in the small hamlet of Sintzenitch, adjacent to Meitshet in the province of Grodno, White Russia. His parents, Joseph and Reisha, were G-d-fearing busi ness people who earned a livelihood by conducting the post office and inn for their small village. Shelomoh was early recognized as a precocious youngster, and his father sought a capable melamed for him in the larger community of Meitshet when the boy was a mere five years old. By the age of seven, he was absorb ing three double folio pages of Tal mud a week in the tractate Bezah, with all its commentaries. Not only did he comprehend the Tosofoth, November-December 1967

ly three-blat schedule. His father felt that the caliber of the tutors he could engage for private lessons would not be sufficient for his son’s abilities. He therefore chose to send Shelomoh to a Talmud Cheder in a larger city where he would be in a regular class with other youngsters his age. For a year Shelomoh studied in such an in stitution in Novohrodak, but his searching mind was not satisfied with the level of study. At the age of nine, he was sent to the Slonim Yeshivah where he was placed in a class of teenagers. Here his scholastic pro gress was satisfying, but socially he was ill-treated by the older students who resented his brilliance. Being shy and acquiescent by nature, he ignored their taunts and continued to immerse himself in his studies. When Shelomoh turned twelve, Aaron Rabinowitz, a student of the Volozhin Yeshiva who lived in a nearby village, urged Joseph Polachek to enroll his son in this famed in stitution. Though doubtful that he 29

could succeed in having the world’s leading Torah academy accept his youngster, the elder Polachek decided to attempt it. Upon meeting the can didate for admission, the Rosh HaYeshivah, Rabbi Naphtali Tzvi Yehudah Berlin, quizzically asked the father if he had also brought a crib along for the twelve-year-old young ster. However, Rabbi Chaim Soloveitchik soon recognized the boy’s capa bilities as they discussed Talmudic problems. Rav Chaim exclaimed, “Not a child or a youngster stands before me, but a great Illui—the Illui from Meitshet!” Thus a new name was created for the young Shelomoh, and throughout his life, he was most com monly known by the appellation “Meitsheter Illui.” However, while the Torah world honored the youngster, it did not start a new period of self-esteem for the Meitsheter as it did for other child prodigies who were incipient Gedoley Ha-Torah. Instead, the Meitsheter re mained his withdrawn, quiet self, con stantly engrossed in intellectual queries. N 1891, Count Delianov, then Russian Minister of Education, presented to the Volozhin Yeshiva a plan authorized by the Czarist gov ernment which required that not less than three hours daily be devoted to secular study. Seeing that his instruc tions were not carried out, on January 22, 1892, Delianov closed the doors of the Yeshivah. The Meitsheter followed Rav Chaim to Brisk where Rabbi Soloveitchik be came “Brisker Rav.” Here, in the “Mishmar Klaus” Beth Medrosh, the

tall, lanky teen-ager with the museful eyes continued his incessant studies. Scores of visitors, to the Soloveitchik home spread the fame of the Meit sheter throughout the Torah world. When Shelomoh was sixteen, Rabbi Nathan Tzvi Finkel, the revered “Alter,” succeeded in attracting him to his Yeshivah in Slobodka, which focussed on the intensive ethical teachings of the Mussar movement. Here he also continued to study on his own, frequenting the Yeshivah only for the formal Shiurim of the Roshey Ha-Yeshivah, Rabbis Moshe Mordecai Epstein and Isar Zalman Meltzer and Rabbi Finkel’s Mussar discourses. For the month of Elul, Rabbi Finkel sent Shelomoh to Chelm to be under the aegis of a patriarch of the Mussar movement, Rabbi Simchah Zissel Ziff. However, the maxims of the Mussar movement did not strike a receptive chord in the Meit sheter, and after Succoth, he returned to Rav Chaim in Brisk where he com tinued his studies for the next few years. Afterwards, in 1899, together with Rabbi Eliezer Silver, he went from Brisk to Vilna to study in the “Kib butz”— as the study group was called —of its illustrious spiritual leader Rabbi Chaim Ozer Grodzenski. That year, the Vilna community celebrated the completion of a Talmud study cycle with a siyum ha-shas, the fes tivities lasting seven days. Each of the seven nights, a party was held in a different Vilna Beth Midrash. Rav Chaim Ozer honored the Meitsheter with the Hadran, the concluding ex position. To the amazement of Vilna’s scholars, he began the Hadran on the JEW ISH LIFE

first night and concluded it on the seventh night, with seven brilliant, self-contained, yet interrelated dis courses which encompasses the entire six sedarim of the Talmud. While in Vilna, a citadel of the Haskalah, he was introduced to new areas of study. Many of the students of the Kibbutz who were already mas ters of the Talmud privately studied Russian and Hebrew grammar. The Meitsheter mastered these languages and also read volumes on varied facets of secular knowledge. He be came particularly proficient in mathe matics, and Vilna’s Professor Gatz remarked that “Mathematical scholar ship lost a great savant when the Meitsheter chose to be a Rosh Ye shiv ah.” A T FIRST, Rabbi Polachek was determined not to earn his liveli hood from the Rabbinate. Upon his marriage to an educated young lady from a hamlet near Minsk in 1900, he stipulated that he would not enter the active Rabbinate. Undoubtedly, he did not wish to involve himself in the endless politics which invariably are part of a local communal scene. His inherent shyness and desire to avoid the limelight also contributed to his feelings. Following his mar riage, he invested his dowry in busi ness, only to see his investments fail. After this failure, he returned to Vilna to once again devote himself full-time to Torah study as a porush, in isolation. During this period, in 1905, Rabbi Yitzchok Yaakov Reines, founder of the Mizrachi movement, organized a new yeshivah in Lida where sacred November-December 1967

studies were combined with secular learning. The major part of the cur riculum was devoted to the traditional study of the Talmud and its com mentaries. The students were also in structed in the Hebrew language and literature, Russian, and the general disciplines of secondary education. Rabbi Reines felt that “if it was for merly possible for one to devote him self completely to the study of the Torah without allowing time for secu lar subjects, it is not possible today, when, for economic or other reasons, general knowledge is demanded from everyone, layman and rabbi alike.” {Or Chodosh A l Tziyon, Introduction, p. 10.) Anxious to have the Talmudic department of his Yeshivah on a high level, Rabbi Reines turned to the Meitsheter to serve as the Rosh Yesh ivah. Rabbi Reines knew that the Meitsheter’s learning would be re spected by the many Gedolim who vociferously criticized his Yeshivah for introducing secular study and Zionism into the Yeshivah milieu. On the other hand, he felt, Rabbi Pola chek would be at home in such an environment due to his own mastery of secular knowledge. The Meitsheter gladly accepted this call, as he felt a special kinship to Rabbi Reines because his old friend, Rabbi Aaron Rabinowitz, was now the son-in-law of Reines. It is related that the Meitsheter turned to Rav Chaim for a letter of approbation be fore he left for Lida. Rav Chaim re sponded that he would grant the re^ quest only if the Meitsheter would not go to the Mizrachi Yeshiva. Rabbi Polachek replied that if those were his master’s feelings, he no longer 31

Wanted the letter. Upon hearing thèse words, Rav Chaim declared that he regretted his previous statement and he wrote a hearty letter of approba tion. In Lida, Rabbi Shelomoh Polachek came to terms with himself and the proper utilization of his inherent abilities. Three times a week he de livered his Shiurim to the eager stu dents who gathered around him. All week he would dedicatedly prepare and organize chiddushim for his lec tures, responding with memorable brillance to the queries that his stu dents directed at him. By the time World War I broke out, he had amassed notes on 1,500 different Shiurim which he had delivered. Dur ing the war, these notes were lost, and he deeply mourned their loss. His family related that despite all the hardships they endured during the war years, the Meitsheter never cried except when he recalled his lost chiddushim. URING World War I, conditions at the Lida Yeshivah worsened. On August 20, 1915, Rabbi Reines passed away. Shortly afterwards, the Meitsheter led the Yeshivah into exile to escape the onslaught of the Ger man armies. For five years it barely continued to exist in the Ukraine un til the Yeshivah completely closed when the area was overrun by the Communists. During this period, near starvation was the constant lot of the war refugees who crowded into the regions where there was no actual fighting. Rabbi Polachek not only had to support his own family but he also provided for the Rabinowitz family

which was cut off from Rabbi Aaron due to the war conditions. The Meit sheter accepted the position of super visor for the local Hebrew school sys tem in his temporary residence. Daily, he visited the schools to ascertain whether they were functioning prop erly. Between the meager income from this task and the black bread provided at the end of the long bread lines, he managed to sustain the two families. Upon the conclusion of the war and the Soviet revolution in the Ukraine, Rabbi Polachek succeeded in crossing into Poland after a har rowing journey. Here, in 1920, he accepted a call to head the Talmud department of the Tachkemoni Rab binical Seminary which was then be ing organized in Bialystok by the Mizrachi. The Tachkemoni conducted a secular program of high school studies and its curriculum also cov ered broad areas of Jewish knowl edge. Here he regained some of the peace which had been his spiritual lot in Lida. While acclimating himself to Bialy stok, events were transpiring in Amer ica which were to change the course of the Meitsheter’s life. Yeshivath Rabbenu Yitzchok Elchanan, the Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Theological Seminary, then located at 301-303 East Broadway on New York’s lower East Side, nucleus of what was later to become Yeshiva University, was experiencing difficulty due to the temporary resignation of its president and Rosh Ha-Yeshivah, Rabbi Dr. Bernard Revel. The latter had re turned to full-time preoccupation with his business interests. Dr. Revel JEW ISH LIFE

urged the Yeshiva to bring the Meitsheter to America to teach its high est Shiur. He felt that Rabbi Polachek’s lectures would be more than an adequate replacement for his own scholarly participation in the Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Yeshiva. Dr. Revel also was convinced that the participa tion of Rabbi Polachek in the Yeshiva’s teaching program would greatly enhance its prestige on the interna tional Torah scene, and its Talmudic department would then be on a par with the level of study at the world famous European yeshivoth. From Tulsa, Oklahoma, Rabbi Revel sent numerous letters to the dean of the American orthodox rabbinate, Rabbi Moses Zebulun Margolies, and to the Yeshivah’s secretary, Dr. Samuel Sar, pleading that they bring the Meitsheter to the Rabbi Isaac Elchanan Yeshiva. A typical letter from Dr. Revel to Sar, dated March 15, 1922, stated: I therefore beg of you again not to delay the matter of the coming of Rabbi Polachek. I will send you from here $300 for his coming, and you in the meantime get all the papers ready for him. À FTER the election in late March, x * - 19Î2, ;of Rabbi Meyer Berlin (Bar-Ilan), the president of the American Mizrachi, to the presidency of the Board of Directors of Yeshivath Rabbi Isaac Elchanan, the Meitsheter was formally invited to the Yeshivah. Although hesitant to travel again, Rabbi Polachek was still attracted by the opportunity to be rharbitz Torah in the leading yeshivah of the New World. He decided to see November-December 1967

whether he could adjust to the Ameri can scene and departed for the United States. Eleven months later, his wife and children followed. At the Yeshiva, the older, ad vanced students eagerly gathered around the Meitsheter during the four days a week that he lectured. Rabbis and scholarly laymen also at tended these Shiurim. America was now blessed with a true godol, and the Yeshiva’s spirit of learning was intensified. Minutes recording the proceedings of an alumni luncheon on November 29, 1923, vividly re capture this atmosphere for us: It seems that the old traditional saying ain Torah, ain Kemach is strictly adhered to when Talmidei Chachomim get together. While the table had been set for a luncheon, somehow or other the center of gravitation seemed to be Rabbi Polachek who sat at a distance from the covered tables. Little by little, the chairs were drawn away from the luncheon table and the group gathered around Rabbi Polachek who gave a discourse on “Chalitzah.” It was one of the most inspiring scenes I have ever witnessed in my life. There sat Rabbi Polachek, pouring forth words of wisdom, and the younger men moved together in a close circle about him, listening with keen interest to every word uttered by the Patriarch. The scene was apparently marred only by the presence of a covered table set for the repast, for observing this group of scholars so concen trated on what the Rabbi was saying that not an iota escape their ears, one was certain that they were as far away from the luncheon as the North Pole is from the South. Not until 33

the Rabbi ceased to speak, were there any comments or questions. It was an inspiring scene indeed. OT ONLY did the“Meitsheter’s” erudition inspire his contempor aries, but his silent pensiveness had an equally salutary affect on Ameri can youth. He constantly had a dreamy, faraway look in his eyes. Even when he walked, his thoughts were involved in intellectual prob lems. A Yeshivah student during this period related how he would con stantly meet the Meitsheter standing still on the Delancey Street subway station, totally lost in thought. He would forcibly take the Meitsheter’s hand and lead him towards the Yesh ivah, and Rabbi Polachek would in variably thank him. While in America, he read The New York Times daily and was con versant with all news and contem porary issues. To a certain degree, he enjoyed an active social life as he participated in all the important as semblies of the Agudas Horabbonim. He actively raised funds for Ezrath Torah, and also joined the Mizrachi. He constantly spoke about his com mitments to the ideals of the rebirth of Zion. Upon Dr. Revel’s permanent re turn to the Yeshivah in September, 1923, the Meitsheter found an even warmer welcome at the school. Dr. Revel was enraptured with the pres ence of the Meitsheter in the Yesh ivah and completely effaced himself in the company of Rabbi Polachek. He attended the Meitsheter’s Shiurim and clarified the chiddushim for the students who did not comprehend the 34

entire lecture. As president, Dr. Revel rejoiced at the enhanced status ac corded the Yeshivah since Rabbi Polachek’s arrival. In an atmosphere such as this, the Meitsheter experienced true spiritual peace for the first time. He no longer had economic worries as he received a dignified stipend from the Yeshivah. He also did not have to endure con stant criticisms from those who op posed his commitments to Zionism and secular study. It is related that when the late Mirrer Rosh Yeshivah, Rabbi Eliezer Judah Finkel, visited America in 1925, he met with the Meitsheter. The Mirrer Rosh Yesh ivah remarked, “Nu, Reb Shelomoh, had you only not been in such a rush to leave Poland, you would today have been a leading Polish Rosh Yeshivah.” To this, Rabbi Polachek replied, “If I had remained a Rosh Yeshivah in Poland, I still would have had to reside in America to avoid the criticisms against me. Therefore it is much better for me to both reside and teach in the United States.” HE Meitsheter nurtured three dreams during this period. He wished to see the chiddushim of his master, Rabbi Chaim Soloveitchik, published. He also wanted to organ ize his own writings, and to visit the Holy Land. Unfortunately, none of these dreams became realities during his lifetime. After a brief illness of two weeks, Rabbi Polachek died of osteomyelitis of the jaw, the result of an abscessed tooth infection, on July 8, 1928. His untimely death at ihe early age of 51, at a time when the

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Yeshivah College building campaign was reaching its successful conclu sion, cast American Orthodoxy into great sorrow. At the services which were conducted at the Yeshivah, tens of thousands of mourners jammed the Yeshivah and the surrounding streets. The press reported that “speaker after speaker broke off in the midst of his tribute, while Dr. Bernard Revel, head of the Yeshivah, collapsed, after insisting upon com pleting his farewell to his ‘friend, associate, and teacher.’ ” Years later, in 1947, Chiddushey Ha-lllui Me-Meitshet was published by his son-in-law, Rabbi Judah Leib Goldberg. This volume consisted of

November-December 1967

his chiddushim on various Talmudic problems as reconstructed from the notes of his students. This volume can therefore not reveal the full span of the Meitsheter’s brilliance, but, nevertheless, it does give some in sight into his profound erudition. Remnants of his famous Vilna Hadran are published in chapter 46 of this volume. Months later, after the initial pain of his death had abated, Dr. Revel was standing one Motzoi Shabboth on the terrace of his apartment. Thinking about the late pioneer American Rosh Yeshivah, Dr. Revel turned to his wife and said, “Pick a bright constellation in the heavens and name it the ‘Meitsheter Illui’!”

To share in a historic experience FIRST WORLD CONFERENCE OF ASHKENAZI AND SEPHARDI SYNAGOGUES

Jerusalem January 8~13, 1968

Teveth 7~12, 5728

Will be convened in the distinguished presence of the world leaders of Torah Jewry and the leaders of the State of Israel

Under the auspices of National Synagogue Bodies and Kehilloth of countries across the globe including Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America

Participation in the World Conference is reserved to members of the official delegations of the convening bodies. 36

JEW ISH LIFE

To share

in a historic experience

FIRST WORLD CONFERENCE OF ASHKENAZI AND SEPHARDI SYNAGOGUES

Enroll through your congregation in the

WORLD CONFERENCE PILGRIMAGE of the UNION OF ORTHODOX JEWISH CONGREGATIONS OF AMERICA The UOJCÄ World Conference Pilgrmage Tours and attendance at the World Conference are reserved exclusively for those accredited to the UOJCA Delegation as submitted by their congregations. Pilgrimage Tour 1 December 26—January 16 22 days $715 Pilgrimage Tour 2 January 1—January 15 15 days $625 Pilgrimage Tour 3 January 7—January 21 15 days $625 Pilgrimage Tour 4 January 6—January 16 11 days $525 (All rates based on fares to and from New York) Fares to New York in connection with the World Conference Pilgrimage Tours enjoy special rates. World Conference Registration: $25 per person, $40 per couple. For enrollm ent, reservations and full details Contact your local UOJCA-affiliated Congregation or write to:

Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America Dept. WCJ, 84 Fifth Avenue, New York, N.Y. 10011 November-December 1967

V isit to Russia By MICHAEL KAUFMAN

N ROUTE via Prague, I re examined my motivations for visiting the Soviet Union in the mid dle of the winter. Russia, I reflected, though no longer remote in modern travel terms, had at times seemed as far away as the moon. But in recent years the Soviet Union and its Jewish com munity had been moving ever closer to my orbit of consciousness as a concerned Jew. A former newspaper man myself, I tend to discount a con siderable amount of what I read in newspapers, especially if the news ac counts emanate from countries not on the friendliest terms with that of the journalists filing the reports. Still, it would be less than honest for me to profess a completely open mind about the USSR and about the situation of Soviet Jewry. All the evidence avail able did seem to point overwhelm ingly to a situation where the Soviet Union’s three million Jews were be ing subtly but forcibly and inexorably assimilated. It seemed an inescapable fact that in essence, Jews there are forbidden all of the religious, cultural,

communal, and educational activities through which the 107 other national ities and religious groups are per mitted, with official sanction, to pre serve their heritage. While I kept telling myself that things could not possibly be as bad in the USSR for the Jews as all that I had read and heard—after all, I mused, the Soviets have an “ad vanced” social system and some of the early leading Bolsheviks were Jews by birth—I thought I owed it to my self, if I had the opportunity, to see, to find out, to ascertain first hand what the situation really was like. The opportunity arose in the form of a business trip to another part of the world entirely, but I decided to go in a roundabout way via the Soviet Union. T MOSCOW, I stayed at the Metropole, not because it was that grand old hotel of Czarist days that journalists seem to like so much, but because it is one of the closest to the Central Synagogue. Arriving late at night, I told the concierge that I

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wanted a taxi at 5:30 the following morning. When he asked where I was going to at that hour (“After all, I must tell the taxi people”) I told him I was going to the Central Synagogue to pray. (The Central Synagogue is the largest of just three remaining shools in Moscow, serving the religious needs of the Soviet Capital’s 500,000 Jews. Russia’s thousands of synagogues of pre-Revolutionary days had dwindled to only 450 by 1956. In the next eight years about 350 of these were closed in a massive drive, leaving only 96 synagogues. By 1966 only 62 syna gogues—and not one yeshivah or other Jewish school—were left. In contrast, the government has trans ported Soviet Moslems to Mecca, has permitted exchanges of visits between Soviet and foreign church delegations, has permitted Russian Orthodoxy to be part of the World Council of Churches and Soviet Moslems of the World Congress of Moslems, and Protestant denominations to regularly attend world religious conclaves and maintain constant contact with Prot estant groups abroad. USSR Jews are even restricted from formal contact with each other, as well as with Jews abroad. There is permitted no central organization of synagogues or rabbis, the means ^hereby all other religious groups in the Soviet Union are legally enabled and encouraged to have close organization.) A reception committee of one was waiting for me that cold, dark, snowy morning, on the steps of the Central Synagogue. The first Soviet Jew I met was age 55-ish, with a furtive look, who approached the taxi and escorted me into the weekday shool. I was early for Shacharith and proceeded to don tallith and t’fillin. Presently, my newNovember-December 1967

found “guide” came over and asked whether I had any siddurira I could give him. When I told him no, he asked me for a pair of t’fillin, and then for a tallith, and then “anything” I might have brought from America for dis tribution to Russian Jews. When I told him I had nothing for him, but would be pleased to lend him my siddur, tallith, and t’fillin for his personal use, he demurred and walked away. Post script: The one man in shool who neither davened nor donned tallith nor t’fillin, was this “guide” of mine. Moreover, he walked around the shool during the entire services carrying a book wrapped in an Israeli newspaper (!) and wherever he went he was shunned by his fellow Jews. (In gen eral, I was to confirm on my visit what other travellers to Russia have previ ously reported—that USSR syna gogues are thoroughly infiltrated by paid informers, among whose tasks is the discouragement of contacts be tween local Jews and foreign Jewish visitors.) I was later informed that there is a closet full of new, unused prayer books and religious articles in the Central Synagogue taken from tourists by this “guide” and others like him—this, despite the obvious need for such items among Moscow’s Jews. There were some eighty men at the morning services, and some time after the start an additional minyon began in an adjoining room, with another 50-60 men participating. The shool is drab. In some respects it reminds one of old shools in Manhattan’s Lower East Side—the elderly Jews, some with beards, the Oron Kodesh, even the pews. However, in two all-important respects the differences were as 39

wide as the physical distance separat ing Moscow from' Manhattan. IRSTLY, there were no young people in the Moscow synagogue. By young people I mean children; I also mean Bar-Mitzvah-age youngsters and teen-agers and college-age young men. This being a weekday, perhaps the attendance of young people was not to be expected in any event, though their abseiice was more total than in any American equivalent. But unlike the latter there seemed a total absence also of men in their twenties, in their thirties and in their forties. I may be mistaken, but I believe there was no one present at the time born after the Russian Revolution in 1917. On Shabbath— also a universal work ing day and school day—the situation is little different. There was another important differ ence. There was little discussion in the shool, before, during, or after the services. What conversation there was, was quiet and subdued, and unless you were looking for it you wouldn’t know any conversation at all took place. A peculiar occurrence during the services: The Baal T ’filah’s Nusach Ha-t’fillah seemed to be closer to that of a Yom Kippur N ’eilah than that of a week-day Shachrith service—and men kept coming up to tell him as much. Moreover, every few minutes the Baal T ’filah would break down and cry. Finally, soon after he said “Borchu” he broke down into uncon trollable sobbing, and was removed from his position, and another man was installed in his place. There was a little hubbub in the lobby as I left the shool, as men and women began queing up to order

matzah for Pesach. This seemed some what remarkable to me, what with Pesach not due for another four months, but I was told this was be cause the bakery behind the Central Synagogue was baking matzah which would have to serve many communi ties which were not accorded the right to bake them. (The severe restrictions placed by the Soviet authorities on the baking of matzoth in recent years have been partially lifted in a few communities, but there are still not enough to go around on Pesach, and the circumstances surrounding the ob taining of matzah—the registration procedure in particular—serve to dis courage many Jews from buying mat zoth who would ordinarily do so. In addition, in some communities where matzoth are available, many Jews do not avail themselves of the opportu nity to do so because of the poor Kashruth standards. (Said one Jew to me in Kiev: “The authorities have placed non observant Jews and, in some cases non-Jews, in charge of and in many of the operations of the matzoth bak ing, with no care being given to proper supervision of the baking. Not only are the matzoth not kosher for Pesach/’ he said, “they are just not kosher. Period.” ) KIEV

UE to scheduling difficulties—I am not sure they were at all accidental—a visit to this city in the heart of the Ukraine was to have been cut down to only six hours. Arriving at the Kiev airport at 12 noon, In tourist told me I would have to catch my next plane out at six in the eve ning.

JEW ISH LIFE

My Intourist guide met me in the airport lobby, and told me that my car and driver were “not here yet, but would arrive in a few minutes.” At 12:15 I asked him where the car and driver were, and he told me they would arrive momentarily. When at 12:30 I got the same reply, I began to suspect that there was more to the delay of car and driver than mere happenstance. My suspicions were confirmed as my guide kept up a running conversation with another Ukrainian, which conversation was liberally sprinkled with the word “Yevrei”—Russian for Jew—repeated from time to time, punctuated with glances in my direction and uproar ious laughter. At one o’clock car and driver had still to arrive, but they were “coming in just a minute.” My guide pulled himself away from his very funny con versation with his buddy for a minute to ask whether I would not, after all, like to spend the rest of the afternoon at the airport, since there was so little I could do in the interim. I told him, no, thank you, and did not add that since it seemed so obvious that my Ukrainian hosts were not anxious for me to spend too much time inJKiev, I was determined to “accidentally” miss that six o’clock flight so I could spend another twenty-four hours in the city. At 1:30, after another “just a min ute until the car and driver arrive,” I informed my guide that if they were not there by 2:00 P.M. I would head out on my own. At this he became somewhat excited, and asked how I was going to get around without him. I told him I would manage. Promptly at two I picked up my bags and walk ed out of the air terminal. I found a November-December 1967

taxi, and with my college Russian in formed the driver I wanted to go to Babi Yar. He told me to get in, and started the engine. As I sat down, my guide came running: ‘‘Mr. Kaufman, Mr. Kauf man, why are you going?” “Because you’re not taking me anywhere,” I replied. “But your car and driver arrived,” he said. “Fine,” I said, “Where is the car?” “Here,” he replied, pointing to a car which had been parked in front of the building since my arrival two hours before. “Where is the driver?” I asked. “Here,” he replied, pointing to the very Ukrainian with whom he had 'shared laughter at my expense during the past two hours. BABI YA R

ATHER than provoke an incid ent, I controlled my temper and R left the taxi and entered the car. When they asked where I want to go, I told them “Babi Yar.” “We don’t know where that is,” my guide replied. “How unfortunate,” I said. “Let me get that taxi again, for the taxi driver knows very well where Babi Yar is.” “No, no,” my guide protested as I made to get out of the car, “we will find it.” P.S. They found Babi Yar without asking directions from any one. I know that Babi Yar was a large ravine at the outskirts of Kiev, and the scene of one of the most horren dous slaughters of human beings in modern times. In this ravine some 100,000 to 200,000 human beings— the exact number is unknown— almost all of them Jews, were gruesomely murdered, machine-gunned, and push41

ed alive from a ledge into the ravine below. Living men, women, and chil dren— 35,000 in one day according to one account—massacred by the Nazis with the active help of Ukrainian police and some of its populace. The fact that it was Jews who were killed at Babi Yar was suppressed by the Russians for 25 years, until, in the early 1960’s, the young Soviet poet Yevgeny Yevtushenko gained interna tional renown almost overnight with his moving poem “Babi Yar.” En route to the car, my guide asked me whether I “had heard anything about Babi Yar.” “A little,” I told him. I asked him whether he knew about it. He answered cautiously that he did, that he knew “some people” had been killed there by the Nazis during the war. “What kind of peo ple?” I asked. “Russians and Ukrain ians,” was his prompt reply. “Any Jews?” I asked. He said he did not think so— and anyway, Jews are equal to all other people in the Soviet Union and they are included in the over-all category of Russians and Ukrainians. I looked surprised, and asked him: “Then Jews now have the word ‘Rus sian’ or ‘Ukrainian’ and no longer have the label ‘Yevrei’ on their in ternal passports identifying them as Jews?” He looked embarrassed and ill at ease, hemmed and hawed a bit, and finally said: “We’re changing that situation in the next few months and Jews will no longer be labeled as such.” (P.S. Needless to say, this situation has, of course, not been changed. Jews are still labeled as such on their internal passports, as are „members of other nationalities, and yet they are still not entitled to any of the advan tages that members of other national 42

ities have-—schools, newspapers, mag azines, books an4 religious periodicals in their own language.. There is no way in which Jews may learn what is going on among Jews in the USSR and throughout the world. In the Ukraine, for example, in 1956, 97% of Ukrainian schools gave instruction in non-Russian native languages. None of these languages, of course, was Yiddish, although it is the mother tongue of hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian Jews.) Under persistent questioning, my guide finally grudgingly admitted that he was aware that the vast majority of those who had been murdered in the mass carnage at Babi Yar were Jews. “However,” he added, “there were also some Russians and Ukrain ians as well.” Babi Yar, ravine of infamy, was under snow. Around it stood new apartment developments, serene in the almost unnaturally pastoral mid-winter scene. My guide left the car with me to walk to the newly installed, small, “temporary” monument that had been put up in response to the international pressure generated by Yevtushenko’s poem. I do not recall the exact wording, but I do remember vividly the guide’s face when he translated the words “Russian and Ukrainian victims of fascism” who were killed by the Nazis at that spot. I looked at him, his face turned red, and he hastened to add that a permanent monument was going up in several weeks’ time. (As of this writing, the best information ava^able indicates that nothing has been done about this.) I asked the guide to return to the car as I wanted to pray. He seemed surprised—I do not know whether JEW ISH LIFE

because the idea of an educated young man praying seemed so foreign to him, or because I wanted him to leave while I said some t’filoth. As he re turned to the car, I stood knee-deep in the snow overlooking this peaceful ravine, and tried desperately to bring to mind the horrendous scene of twenty-five years before, of Nazi machine-gunners who shot and Uk rainian helpers who pushed living Jews from the ledge to the ravine be low, burying the living under the bodies of the dead, then the whole earth-covered ground heaving for days afterwards as those still alive under neath the thousands of bodies sought to rise. I said T’hilim and a ’Moley for their souls and my mind was nearly shattered as I strove to fix their Jew ish faces in my mind’s eye—onehundred-thousand-times-one, two-hundred-thousand-times-one—and all I could see were the faces of my dear ones, relatives and friends. For like those faces, I realized, were the faces of those who were butchered here. But for the life of me I could not conjure up the faces of their Nazi and Ukrainian murderers. I was visibly crying on my return trip to the center of Kiev, and my guide knew better than? to engage me in conversation during the first part of this trip from Babi Yar. We headed for the synagogue. This, after another bout with my driver and guide, both of whom protested they “did not know where it was.” My threat to leave the car and to find it on my own bore fruit, and somehow they found their way to the synagogue. En route to the synagogue we passed Bogdan Chmielnicki Square, featuring the imposing equestrian November-December 1967

statue of Chmielnicki. While my guide stopped the car to tell me all about this great hero of the Ukraine, my thoughts turned to a different version of the life of Zinovi Bogdan Chmiel nicki from the one being told by my Ukrainian friend. I thought of the vicious, sadistic, mass-murdering fore runner of the Nazis and “modern” Ukrainian killers, who in 1648-49 led his Cossacks in the horrendous mas sacre of 300,000 Ukrainian Jews. I looked from the face on the statue to the face of my guide, and then I turned to the driver, and instead of their faces I saw the face of Bogdan. I peered into the faces of the pedes trians hurrying by in the snow, and in each of their faces, men and women alike, I saw the features of Bogdan Chmielnicki—and suddenly the faces of the killers at Babi Yar became illumined in a ghastly light. THE S Y N A G O G U E AT KIEV

E ARRIVED at the synagogue, and my guide offered to accom pany me inside. When I added to my “No, thank you” that there was really no need for supervision of me into the shool, since I was sure they had ac quaintances inside who would take good care of me, they smiled broadly, winked at each other, and left me at the gate. There are more than 100,000 Jews in Kiev—some say twice that number — and they have but one shool left to serve them, all the others having been closed down by the authorities. (One Ukrainian non-Jewish woman told me that her favorite movie theatre used to be a synagogue.) As my introduction to this major city in the Ukraine by my guide in-

dicated, the life of the Jew in Kiev is a difficult one, indeed. As I was to learn, there had not been a B’rith Milah in this city of over 100,000 Jews in seven years! My informant, a young Jewish woman who braved a great deal to maintain her traditions and to bolster others to do likewise, told me that on one occasion she had urged a relative who had a newborn son to see the mohel, and that after much hesita tion and trepidation had finally per suaded him to do so. The mohel, who was also the shochet, flatly refused to perform the ages-old Jewish cere mony, leaving the woman to conclude: “Had he performed the ceremony, not just B’rith Milah, but Shechitah as well would have been prohibited in Kiev.” I asked her how she knew that no circumcisions had been performed clandestinely during this period. She replied: “The very first time that child had a medical examination, the fact of his circumcision would be immedi ately reported to the authorities, and the child’s parents and the mohel who performed the ceremony would be ar rested and probably disappear.” I learned that unlike most Western countries where circumcision is almost de rigeur in most hospitals and con sidered a mark of good preventive medicine, the custom is considered barbaric by the Soviet authorities, and the circumcision of non-Jews is vir tually unknown. HERE is a yard along the side of the Kiev synagogue which leads to the rear of the synagogue and to the entrance of the lower, or “week day” shool. I entered to find some fifty to sixty men present, all appear ing to be in their seventies, eighties,

and nineties. These were later aug mented by the arrival of some fifty additional men—some bearded, all wearing warm fur hats. My entrance made little visible impact. Although my clothes were obviously Western—my American winter coat all too inadequate for the Ukraine in January—and the very appearance in this synagogue of one of my age con firmed that I was not a Soviet citizen —the only person who came over to me was a single, aged, diminutive Jew who invited—nay, urged—me to sit in a pew up front. I thanked him but told him I preferred to daven iii the rear. Aside from occasional quick, furtive glances in my direction, seem ingly no notice was taken of a Jew who had obviously arrived from 4,000 miles away—from another world. Minchah passed, and another minyon started a few minutes later. Still no Sholom Aleichem, no “Vas Macht a Yid?,” no “Vus hert zach in Amer ica?” I did not exist. Maariv came and went and still no further notice that a newcomer was in their midst. As I walked out of shool, I stopped before a group of half-a-dozen of the old men, and asked whether anyone knew where a Jewish traveller could get a kosher meal. Some animated discus sion ensued, but no one came up with a name or place. Instead, for the first time in my life i saw fear, naked fear, in the eyes of at least two of the Jews. I walked toward the courtyard, and while donning my coat noticed that the old Jew who had asked me to sit up front was now “escorting” me out of the shool to ascertain, I surmised, that no one spoke with me. As I reached into my inside coat pocket to draw out my scarf, he immediately and agitatedly began protesting: “Mir JEW ISH LIFE

darfett gornisht haben, mir darfen gornisht haben, mir haben alles.” When he saw my scarf he breathed easier and his face reddened. I told him: “Dacht zach mir ir proiestirt tsu fit.” HE next morning at Shacharith, I was again seemingly coldly ig nored by the congregation. It was a Thursday and the Torah was read, but no one came over to offer me an aliyah, although this very fact alone would indicate that all is not well with Kiev’s Jews. For hundreds of years a Jew visiting a synagogue other than the one he usually frequents, even in the same city in which he resides, could expect to be honored with an aliyah to the Torah—let alone a trav eller from another town, or from k distant country. But no effort was even made to ascertain whether I was a Kohen, Levi, or Yisroel. At one point, following a brief meeting at the front of the shool, the Baal T ’filah began saying T’hilim. And a man soon passed me and said, as if to himself, “T’hilim MemDaled,” (Psalms 44). As it is not my custom to say T’hilim in the morning I did not readily open my siddur to the T’hilim. In a flash I realized, how ever, that I had been put on notice for something, and almost simultane ous with the return of the man to again say loudly to himself the words “T’hilim Mem-Daled” I had the T ’hilim open, and I was reading King David’s prophetic Psalm about Russias Jewry written some 3,000 years ago:

For the Leader; a Psalm of the sons of Korach. Maskil. O G-d, we have heard with our ears, our fathers have told us; November-December 1967

A work Thou didst in their days, in the days of old. Thou with Thy hand didst drive out the nations and didst plant them in; Thou didst break the people, and didst spread them abroad. For not by their own sword did they get the land in possession, Neither did their own arm save them; But Thy right hand, and Thine arm, and the light of Thy countenance, Because Thou wast favorable unto them. Thou art my King, O G-d; Command the salvation of Jacob. Through Thee do we push down our adversaries; Through Thy name do we tread them under that rise up against us. For I trust not in my bow, Neither can my sword save me. But Thou hast saved us from our adversaries, And hast put them to shame that hate us. In G-d have we gloried all the day, And we will give thanks unto Thy name forever. Selah. Yet Thou hast cast off, and brought us to confusion; And goest not forth with our hosts. Thou makest us to turn back from the adversary; And they that hate us spoil at their will. Thou hast given us like sheep to be eaten; And hast scattered us among the nations. Thou sellest Thy people for small gain, And hast not set their prices high. Thou makest us a taunt to our neigh bors, A scorn and derision to them that are around us. Thou makest us a byword among the nations, A shaking of the head among the peoples. All the day is my confusion before me, and the shame of my face hath covered me. For the voice of him that taunteth and blasphemeth; By reason of the enemy and the revengeful. 45

All this is come upon us; yet have we not forgotten Theey Neither have we been false to Thy covenant. Our heart is not turned back, Neither have our steps declined from Thy path; Though Thou hast crushed us into a place of jackals, And covered us with the shadow of death. If we had forgotten the name of our G-d, or spread forth our hands to a strange god; Would not G-d search this out? For He knoweth the secrets of the heart. Nay, but for Thy sake are we killed all the day; We are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.

Awake, why steepest Thou, O Lord? Arouse Thyself, cast not off forever. Wherefore hidest Thou Thy face And forgettest our affliction and our oppression? For our soul is bowed down to the dust; Our belly cleaveth unto the earth. Arise, Help us And redeem us for Thy mercy’s sake. I covered my face with my tallith to hide my emotions as for the first time I grasped and understood fully the extent of the travail and the depth of feeling which had prompted this earth-shaking affirmation of their faith in G-d, a message of faith to be carried by me out of their shool in Kiev to Jews the world over. As I left the shool, I realized that l had still not been greeted, question ed, or approached by anyone there, save the one who asked me to sit in the front the evening before—and I, in turn, approached no one. Indica tions were plentiful that informers were scattered throughout the syna gogue, and I desired to place no per46

son there in jeopardy by cngagirig him in conversation. 'T 'H A T afternoon my guide took me to a large, walled ancient Rus sian Orthodox monastery, I believe it was the Kiev-Pechora-Lavra, an entire town-within-a-town, surrounded by high walls—more than ninety build ings, church upon church, cupolas and belfries by the scores, converted by the government into a Museum of Religion, and generally known as “Museum Town.” In Soviet nomen clature, “Museum of Religion” means “Museum of A «¿/-Religion.” After viewing some of the exhibits— a typi cal one was a painting of Russian Orthodox churchmen bleeding peas ants by taking all their money for the church-—we met an elderly Ukrainian woman walking through the com pound with a bottle of holy water she had just secured. She stopped to talk to me, with my guide translating, telling me she did so because I looked like a foreigner. I told her I was an American. “Are you religious?” she asked. I told her I tried to be. “What is vour religion?” she asked. I said: “I am a Jew.” The Ukrainian woman spat on the ground in front of me, and she said: “How awful it is that young people in this country are taught to hate and to laugh at religion.” I replied quietly: “True, but how wonderful to hear you talk so freely and complain about it. My Jewish co-religionists are afraid to even talk to me.” Back in shool for Minchah, again no one came over to speak to me. I began getting ready to leave—1 was rushing to catch my flight, twenty-four hours later than had been originally scheduled for me to leave Kiev—and JEW ISH LIFE

as I was preparing to leave before the start of Maariv, indicating that this was a departure to meet a schedule, I could see some Jews becoming somewhat agitated. An elderly Jew sauntered by my pew and said, as if to himself: “Es is kalt dah, nein?” Sensing that this was no ordinary com mentary upon the weather but an at tempt to assure m e that their silence was not self-imposed, I replied “I am warm.” A second Jew came by, with a similar “It’s cold in our shool, isn’t it?” I replied: “Oftimes it may seem cold outside, but inside it is warm, indeed.” Two others came by with the “It’s cold here” routine before I headed towards the rear of the shool. I looked into the faces of the Jews near the door and saw beseeching, warm eyes. “Do not forget us,” they seemed to say, but no one said anything. I said “Shalom Aleichem” and I noticed tears in the eyes of two old Jews at the doorway as I walked out. Outside, I turned into the courtyard and then into the street. It was very cold and it was snowing. A couple of blocks from the shool I heard the voice of a man walking behind me, sobbing in Yiddish: “Forgive us, for we cannot help ourselves.” “I understand,” I said without turning around, “there is nothing for which forgiveness is neces sary.” “Please understand us,” he im plored, “we are Anusim, we have no command over our behavior—and our action is watched by mosrim.” “I un derstand perfectly,” I said, “please risk no more.” His voice shaking with sobs, he beseeched: “Please do not forget us.” “I won’t forget you,” I said. “We need you so November-December 1967

desperately,” he sobbed. And he dis appeared in the snow. If ever the slightest doubt existed in mind of the existence of an irra tional, virulent, vicious antisemitism which has as its sole aim the spiritual destruction of the Jewish people by the denial to them of their religious, cultural, educational, and communal rights as individuals and as a group, and to pursue their right to perpetuate their historic heritage as an ethnic group within the Soviet Union, I was disabused of any such lingering doubt as a result of my visit to Kiev. . . . VILNA

ILNIUS, capital of Lithuania, was next on my itinerary. But to Jews throughout the world it will always be Vilna, home of the Great Gaon, The Jerusalem of Lithuania. Is there a Jew who has studied Torah during the past two centuries who has not heard of Vilna? Vilna, center of Torah, where giants of Torah were born and nurtured in an atmosphere of Torah unparalleled in European Jewish history. Vilna, home of 107 synagogues. That is, until Communism came to Vilna twenty-five years ago. In 1967, after a quarter of a cen tury of Soviet rule there is only one shool left in Vilna, serving some 22,000 Jews. And no yeshivoth or Jewish schools of any kind for that matter. By the time of my arrival in Vilna it was apparent to anyone observing the nature of my travels that my visit to the Soviet Union in the middle of the cold winter was anything but a pleasure trip. Accordingly, I was given very special treatment. My rooms at the Neringa Hotel were in full view

■

of the hotel desk. The« two-room suite was obviously bugged, with micro phones which looked like microphones all over the place. The constant ac tivity in the room next to mine and the near-Keystone Cops comedy rou tine of men running back and forth to the rooms adjoining mine when ever I entered my suite provided a leitmotif background and comic re lief from the deadly serious nature of my trip. Lithuania, where Communism ar rived rather late, at least superficially, seem to have a more humane ap proach to its treatment of the Jews. (This, despite the spread of a “Blood Liber’ before Pesach, 1963, that a six-year-old girl had been kidnapped and captured by the Jews to obtain Christian blood. It was not until the discovery of the child’s body and proof that she had been murdered by a Lithuanian student who had com mitted suicide that a wave of attacks upon Jewish school children ceased.) This was apparent soon after I en tered the synagogue Friday morning to daven. There were some twenty or twentyfive men in the shool and, following the pattern in the rest of the USSR, all were very old. Some ten minutes after I entered, the first Jew hesitat ingly approached and offered me a Sholom Aleichem and quickly return ed to his seat. This action was soon emulated by several others, and the contrast in the atmosphere between Kiev and Vilna was obvious. Another indication that echoes of its glorious past were still alive in Vilna, was a Shiur in Mishnah on a high level, given by the community shochet every morning after the services. When the Rosh Hakahal, the gov48

ernment appointed lay .head of the Jewish community, entered, he in troduced himself to me and asked whether he could be helpful. I thanked him for his offer which I accepted with alacrity, asking whether I could see the cemetery—where the Vilna Gaon and Rav Chaiym Ozer are buried—and the Ponar Forest. He agreed to take me, and after Shacharith we caught a taxi—its driver, in cidentally, was a Jew, so the three of us conversed in Yiddish—and we drove to the cemetery. The cemetery, under the supervi sion of the Jewish community, seemed very well maintained, and the Rosh Hakahal seemed very pleased with my compliments about the cemetery. The Gaon’s kever was nicely kept up, and I was pleased to see the new Ohel over the grave of Rav Chaiym Ozer, zts’l, recently installed as a result of the efforts of Rav Pinchas Teitz of Elizabeth, New Jersey. PONAR

HE Ponar Forest is Lithuania’s Babi Yar. Situated near a large rail junction outside Vilnius, it was the site of the massacre of perhaps a quarter of a million persons by the Nazis, the large majority of them Jews. Unlike Babi Yar, there is a monument at the “Panerei,” and there are memorials and signs and even a small grisly museum. Here, too, however, as at Babi Yar, no references are made to the fact that it was primarily the Jews who were singled out and massacred at Ponar. The references are all to anonymous “victims of fascism.” Is it

JEW ISH LIFE

no wonder, I thought as I looked at one of the deep artificial chasms atop which there stood a sign stating blandly “Here 18,000 bodies were found,” that antisemitism still exists in the hearts and souls of these peo ple when the government does all it can to erase the facts of previous horrendous acts of Nazi antisemitism? Upon my return to the city we headed for the old Jewish q u a r te rnow nearly demolished and replaced by newer apartment houses. We visit ed with a family to whom I was carrying regards from a relative. The home was shabby and poorer than any I had ever seen in America, but it had that special Erev Shabboth aroma which filled it with a richness that only a fellow Jew—no matter where he came from-—would recog nize instantly. Challahs were baking, fish, kugel, and cholent were in preparation. The patriarch of the family, in his late seventies or early eighties, was ob servant and spoke Yiddish well. His daughters just barely spoke the lan guage, and their observance seemed nominal. The teen-age grandchildren neither spoke nor understood a word of Yiddish, could read no Hebrew, and could not make a b’rochah. The family pressed several Challahs upon me — and it was indeed a nachath ruach for me in my hotel room that evening to eat freshly baked Challahs. Friday evening Sabbath services were held in the “weekday shool,” because, as I was told, there were not enough funds to heat the large main shool, now used only in sum mertime. I was invited to be the Baal T ’filah for Kabbolath Shabboth MaarN ovem ber-Decem ber 1967

iv services and immediately accepted. Following the services, whatever re serve the remnants of this generationsold vital Jewish community may have had were lowered, as I was warmly greeted by all present, who wished me a Yiyoshor Kochacha and a Gutten Shabbos. One relatively young man (in his mid-forties) said he recognized my nusach hat’filah, and wondered where I had learned it. When I told him that I had picked it up at the Telzer Yeshiva in Cleveland, Ohio, he grabbed me and hugged me, inform ing me that he too had been a talmid in Telz, in Lithuania before the war. He enthusiastically recited the names of some of his chaverim in the Yesh iva, several of whom are present-day Roshey Yeshivah in Telz in Cleve land. I understood from several others at the shool that this young man was an exceptional Talmid Chochom who was held in high regard by the con gregants. Be it mentioned that this same man excused himself, say ing he would not be in shool the fol lowing morning since he had been accepted into a medical clinic on that day. By sheer coincidence, the follow ing afternoon I witnessed the young man coming from work. I looked away, not wishing to embarrass him. The incident graphically brought home to me, however, the extreme difficulties in practicing Judaism in the Soviet Union today. The keystone to Judaism is the Sabbath. How ls it possible for Shab both to be preserved as it had been for the past twenty centuries of Goluth in a State where Saturday is a work day for all Soviet citizens, 49

and a school day for their children? Where the second day of rest after Sunday is Wednesday? There was no doubt in my mind that there is a sad variety of reasons for the paucity of young people in synagogues in the USSR. Undoubtedly, however, a major factor was the virtual impos sibility for people who either worked for a living or attended schools to attend a synagogue on Saturday. HABBOTH morning it was S snowing hard, and I lost my way en route to the synagogue. When I arrived late and opened the door into the shool, there seemed to be a little commotion and surprise at my en trance and I was warmly greeted in the middle of the service. I was in formed later that when I was late in arriving, it was naturally assumed that I had been detained by the authorities, and that no one there would ever see me again. When I asked why this was so “naturally” assumed no one would tell me. I was again asked to lead the serv ices as Baal T’filah, and unlike Kiev where I was not even called to the Torah, I was honored with Maftir in Vilna. When invited to deliver a sermon I demurred at first, saying I was a layman and not a rabbi. At the insistance of various members of the congregation that I deliver a mes sage from American Jews, however— one elderly gentleman quipped that they had been hosts to many Ameri can rabbis over the years, and they were beginning to believe there were no observant Jewish laymen in America, and would I prove them wrong—I rose to speak. 50

My message was a brief, one, and it being Parshath B’shalach, I selected the incident from the Maftir Vayovoh Amalek, which points up that even Moshe Rabbenu required the assist ance of Aharon and Hur on both sides of him to vanquish Amalek . . . The Rosh Hakahal escorted me the kilometer’s walk through the streets of Vilna to the block of my hotel. No sooner did he leave, however, when I heard a “Psst, Reb Yid.” I turned around to find a Jew. He said “I must talk with you privately.” As bad as the conditions were in my hotel room, he preferred to talk with me there than in the open on the street. After we entered the room, but before we talked, I removed my shoe, and began a steady banging of the shoe against the coffee table near a microphone. The Jew burst into tears and in formed me that during recent months a number of restrictions had been placed on the Jewish community— the closing of the mikveh, the limit ing of shechitah, and, finally, two weeks previous, all shechitah of ani mals was prohibited, and only the shechitah of poultry was allowed. I listened to my guest intently, and, at a loss for what else to say, com miserated with him. Whereupon he burst out: “I don’t want your pity or commiseration! This is not why I came to you!” “What do you expect me to do?” I asked. He replied: “I want you to go to the Minister of Religion and Culture and protest.” “What?” I in terjected. “Here I am banging at the table because my room is bugged. I am watched wherever I go. And I am JEW ISH LIFE

4,000 miles away from America.” At this my visitor jumped up and began berating me: “What could happen to you? The worst that could happen would be that you would be arrested and detained, and until your family gets in touch with the Ameri can Ambassador in Moscow who will arrange your release, you may taste the life in a Lithuanian prison for a couple of weeks. Do you know, how ever, what I risked by even coming to you? I might disappear never to be seen nor heard from again, or, possibly, return to my family follow ing an absence of fifteen years during which time I would be in a Siberian labor camp. “Now—Are you a Jew, or what are you?!” At this I rose and told him I would see the Minister of Religion and Cul ture. I told him I would need my Intourist interpreter. My visitor said he would be nearby. I got hold of my Vilna guide, an intelligent young woman, and I told her I wanted to go to the Ministry of Religion. She looked somewhat surprised, and said she would be glad to accompany me but she did not know where it was. Outside the hotel with my Intourist guide, I approached the first person I saw— (by “sheerest coincidence” it turned out to be my earlier visitor)— and in my elementary Russian told him I wanted to know where the Impolna Modzyitsa—the Ministry of Religion and Culture—was. He said that by coincidence he was walking in that direction and he would be pleased to take us there. November-December 1967

H T WAS a long and tortuous walk, and when we got there we thanked our helpful “guide.” (My interpreter, commenting upon the long way the gentlemen had walked with us, told me that all Lithuanians were this kind and helpful.) The Ministry of Religion and Cul ture occupied a suite of several rooms on the third floor of a small office building. We informed a secretary in the ante-office that I wished to see the Minister. She left and returned to inform us that he would be able to see me shortly. In a few minutes we were taken into the Minister’s office. It was plainly furnished, the most prominent objects in the room being two huge stylized photo-portraits of Lenin on one wall of a high-ceilinged room. The minister was a tall, husky Rus sian—unlike my interpreter, who was Lithuanian—and the conversation was held in English and in Russian. He greeted me cordially and offered me some vodka. I began by saying that the situation I came to discuss should ordinarily be of no concern to me, a national of another country. How ever, I said, since I was directly af fected, and since I was certain that the minister would want to have the situation encountered by this tourist brought to his attention, I took the liberty of seeing him. I am a Jew, I told him. As a Jew, I observe the religious laws of Kashruth, the 3500-year-old rules regard ing food, the source of which is the Bible, relating to both the types of food we may eat and their prepara tion. As a traveller, I said, I have found it possible to get kosher food

all over the world, and in most siz able cities I have usually found kosher restaurants. In Russia, I said, I found no kosher restaurants. How ever, in each city’s synagogue I equ ally managed to find someone who would invite a traveller to have a kosher meal. Except in Vilna, I said. In Vilna, I was told, this was because the vital preliminary preparation for kosher meat, the kosher slaughter of animals, was prohibited recently by the order of the Ministry of Religion and Culture. In America, I continued, we are told there is full freedom of religion for all in the USSR, and I was cer tain neither he nor I would like for me to return home with the impress sion that the freedom of the Jews to practice their religion in the manner they had been doing for thousands of years throughout the world had been abbrogated in Lithuania by the Minister of Religion and Culture. My little speech completed with perhaps less trepidation than I ex pected, the minister replied. He said I did the right thing by coming to him, but surely I was mistaken in my facts. I assured him I was not and pro duced figures given to me by my visitor on the amount of kosher meat consumption in previous weeks and the number of cattle slaughtered ritually in past weeks. He seemed im pressed by the recitation of facts and figures, and, surprisingly, he grudg ingly admitted that I was correct in that the kosher slaughter of animals was now forbidden. However, he added, “This was the will of the Jews themselves.” 52

How did he know that?, I asked. He replied, with a smile, that if this was not the case why was it that none of the Jews have protested about this? What is more, he added, his smile broadening, if a delegation from the Jewish community would come to see him about this and tell him that they wanted the restoration of the kosher slaughter of animals he would con sider restoring the kosher slaughter so they could have kosher meat. Self-satisfied with his transparent attempt at deception, the smile still on his face, the minister sat back while the interpreter completed the translation. I turned to the interpreter and said: “Please tell the worthy min ister—would he think I, an American Jew, would be sitting here in his office right now if the Jews of Vilna felt they could safely and easily approach the Minister of Religion and Culture as I have to complain about a matter such as this one without feeling repercussions?” T TP TO this point our conversation had been cordial but correct. I was unsure how the minister would react to this unexpected frankness on my part, and I waited anxiously for my words to be translated. At the conclusion, the minister suddenly jumped up, and I rose instinctively, and he grabbed me in a light bear hug, laughed loudly and said: “Tovarisch, we understand each other.” When he calmed down, he seemed pleased that I had spoken plainly and had indicated to him a total aware ness of the situation in which Lithu anian Jews and their leaders found JEW ISH LIFE

themselves. He said that he would certainly take care of the situation now that he was aware of the extent of it and how the Jewish community felt about it, and would see to it that kosher slaughter was reinstituted. He thanked me for seeing him and we parted amiably. Sketchy and unverified information reaching me subsequently indicated that soon after my trip the shechitah of animals was reinstituted in Vilna, but that some time thereafter it may have been suspended once again. In any case, the incident seemed to underscore for me the great sen sitivity Soviet authorities have to for eign public opinion. While discussion —far less than in the past—may still occasionally be heard in this country regarding the advisability of public protest by Jews and others outside the USSR about the denial of the rights of Jews in the Soviet Union, these discussions have become more and more muted as evidence becomes known of the demonstrable efficacy of world-wide protests in producing verifiable easing of conditions for Soviet Jews. The partial lifting of the ban on the baking of Matzah, for example, and the slight easing of emigration restrictions, as another ex ample, are concrete results of Soviet reaction to protests abroad. In private conversations I had with Russian Jews, they one and all in dicated that such public protests and demonstrations abroad were importe ant and were welcomed by the Jews of the Soviet Union, and that the easing of conditions and the lifting of certain restrictions against Jews could be traced to such protests by November-December 1967

Jews in Western countries. Typical of replies I received to the query—>. Wouldn’t such protests result in even further difficulties for Russian Jews? was one I received from one young woman—“What more can they do to us?” They could, of course, do much more. But Soviet Russia is, after all, not Nazi Germany. And most knowledgable and informed travellers to the Soviet Union agree that the key to the lifting of restrictions by the Soviet authorities against their Jew* ish citizens lies in their being made aware that Jews and non-Jews abroad —and their governments—are deeply concerned about Soviet discrimination against the Jews. TRAIN RIDE

N an overnight train trip to Moscow, as I walked past the compartment next to mine I thought I heard some Yiddish spoken, and I did a quick double-take and intro* duced myself to the occupants. In the compartment was a woman of about 38 or 40 and her eleven-yearold daughter. At first they did not answer me in Yiddish, speaking only in Russian. When I made it clear that I was an American Jewish tour ist, however, I was invited into their compartment, and we closed the door and talked at length. The girl under* stood Yiddish well and spoke it halt ingly. This was rather remarkable in a country where no Jewish schools of any kind—religious or secular— exist, where Yiddish is taught not at all, and where even the teaching of

Alef-Beth is prohibited, let alone the teaching of Hebrew. (Despite everything, however, some instruction does take place clandes tinely. In one city a young Jewish woman asked to be excused from con tinuing our conversation because she was late for a class she was giving. Aware that she was a university graduate in a technical field, I asked her what she was teaching. “Mamaloshon” was the reply. “Isn’t that dan gerous?” I asked. She admitted that it was, and said that in order to com ply with the requirements of the group of young men and women in their early twenties who had request^ ed her to teach the clandestine class in the apartment of one of the mem bers of the group, she always travelled to the apartment via several buses and taxis in order to lose persons who might be following her. (She smiled and added: “Oib a Yiddish kind bet zich tsu lernen a Yiddish vort, vi azoy ken ich em antzagen”—“If a Jewish child begs to learn a word of Yiddish, how could I possibly deny the request.”) The two were not very observant— they insisted this situation was not of their choosing—but they were very conscious of their Jewishness. It may well be that the compulsory identification of all Soviet Jews as “Yevrei” on their internal passports, while in some respects seemingly in dicative of some kind of quasi-official Soviet antisemitism—because, as we pointed out, Jews are not accorded the benefits other nationalities whose members are similarly described by their nationalities are accorded in the Soviet Union—this ploy has back 54

fired and may very well be a major factor militating against the simul taneous forces working for the total assimilation of Jews in the Soviet Union. For, even should Jews wish to as similate, their passports with the title “Yevrei” remain. And wherever a Jew will go, whether he will apply for work or housing, he is a Jew. If this is the case, young Jews ask them selves, who are we? What are we? And the Jewish consciousness begins to work on the individual and some times remains a bulwark against many forms of forced assimilation. Mother and daughter both ques tioned me closely about Israel, and it was obvious that much of the Soviet propaganda about Israel had taken its toll among Soviet Jews. Although they manifested doubt about much of what they had read in the Soviet press about Israel, it was evident that they believed there must be a substantial amount of truth to discourage ap plications for emigration to Israel. Applicants for emigration, I was told, almost immediately lose their jobs, and are unemployable during the period of the consideration of such applications. This period may be as short as six months, and it may last for years. During the period when a small but regular trickle of Jewish emigration was permitted, there was a certain arbitrariness about which applications were approved and which were rejected that does not seem ra tional to observers. The woman questioned me closely about Russian immigrants in Israel and their supposed dissatisfaction with their lot in Israel. What impressed me JEW ISH LIFE

ihbst about her, however, was her iron determination to teach her young daughter Yiddish and to impress upon her that she was part of the Jewish experience . . .

all over the world, and, on occasion, the display of my Arba Kanfoth worn under my shirt, were enough to in dicate that I could be spoken to frankly.

URING my visit to the Soviet T IS of tremendous importance that D Union, I met many Jews. I met I most of American Jewish trav them all over—in the synagogues, in

ellers to the Soviet Union who are the streets, in parks, in stores, in air going to ascertain the conditions of ports, and on a train. There are a num their Soviet Jewish brethren be ob ber of pertinent general observations I servant Jews. If they are not, it is could make. In almost all cases, my vital that they be made aware of the initial contacts were hesitant ones. It sensitivity of the Jews in the USSR always took me a while to break for if they are not carefully briefed down the artificial barrier which has they can do tremendous psychological been thrown up by the Jews them damage to the Jews with whom they selves as a measure of self-defence— come in contact. a barrier of fear, hesitation, and un When I was about to leave the easiness, which barrier did not exist Metropole Hotel for the Moscow in anywhere near a similar degree Central Synagogue my first morning with any of the non-Jews I met durin Russia, I met a group of about ng my stay. ten Americans in the hotel lobby. I I found, however, that as soon as approached one of them, who was Russian Jews learned that I was reli obviously attempting to draw atten giously observant and knowledgable tion to his Jewishness by carrying an the barriers melted away. It was not El A1 Israel Airlines flight bag, and my presence in the synagogue alone learned that he was the leader of an which indicated observance—as I official group of American Jews who shall soon show—but my repeated were leaving the USSR that morning, presence at all services—Shacharith, following a fact-finding mission about Minchah, and Maariv; the fact that the status of Russian Jewry. When I davened in the shools—and those I asked what they had seen, he told who were interested made certain to verify this; and that I wore Tallith me, as I recall, that they had been and T’fillin, and seemed completely at a performance of a Yiddish theatre at home in the shool in all other group in Vilna, where they had met several Jews, and they had also vis respects. When meeting Jews outside of ited two synagogues. They had been shool, I found that the insertion by to the Moscow synagogue one after me of certain select Yiddish and noon, and they had also been at the Hebrew words and phrases in my Vilna synagogue the previous Satur conversation which underscored the day morning, and one of the mem community of interest of Torah Jews bers of their group had conveyed November-December 1967

greetings from American Jewry to those present in the synagogue. Since I was in Vilna the following Shabboth, the effect that this group had on the Jews of Vilna was still reverberating. There was no doubt in my mind that the warmness shown to me by these Jews was partially the result of the complete consternation into which they had been thrown as a result of the behavior of the visiting American Jewish group the week previous, and that I seemed to repre sent to these Vilna Jews the very antithesis of what was represented by the visitors of the previous week. As reconstructed from various re ports given to me by the congregants present, when the group arrived the previous Shabboth morning, they ar rived in style—in two cars. The cars drew up in front of the synagogue, and out poured the men and women who made up this American Jewish group that was there to see about the religious and cultural situation of Soviet Jewry. They came with their travel bags and their cameras, and they trooped in to the shool. Tfye prayers were naturally disrupted dur ing this time, and as they walked past the Oron Ha-Kodesh one or more of the women snapped pictures of the men in the shool. One of the men was honored with an aliyah to the Torah. When he arrived at the Bimah, he asked the gabbay whether he had a copy of the b’rochoth for the Torah in English. After he barely managed to get through the b’rochoth with the aid of the gabbay, and while still at the Bimah, he asked the gabbay if there 56

were any young people who ever came to shool in Vilna. At this, the gabbay retorted: “Do any young people ever come to shool in America?” Following the service the leader of the delegation in response to a re quest took out his pen and wrote down the names and addresses of congregants’ relatives in the United States to whom he was to convey regards. When it was all over the delega tion entered the cars and were off to their next destination to find out more '‘facts” about Russian Jewry. When upon my return, I got in touch with the head of this delegation in New York and suggested that he and his delegation might have comported themselves in a manner more in keep ing with the responsibility they had, and suggested further that such future American Jewish groups could learn by the reaction of the Vilna Jews to the behavior of his delegation, his response was an interesting one. First, he denied the facts as told to me. Then, he ad mitted that some of the reports made to me were true and that others were not. Then he told me that I was told this information by “Communists” in the shool who were annoyed at the good reaction the Vilna Jews had to his visiting delegation. Finally, he strongly implied that I was a Com munist. further observations—There SOME is a tremendous need by Russian Jews for religious articles, siddurim and chumoshim, t’fillin, taleithim and luchoth. While most religious groups JEW ISH LIFE

in the USSR produce and distribute religious and devotional articles, the manufacture of Taleithim and T’fillin is strictly forbidden. Although Soviet authorities have, in recent years, per mitted limited publication of Bibles and prayer books for the Russian Orthodox, the Baptists, and the Mos lems, no Jewish Bible has been al lowed to be published for half-acentury, and a paltry 3,000 copies of a siddur were run off ten years ago. Most of the taleithim I saw during my trip were in tatters, and the siddurim were both scarce and in poor condition. Jews risked a great deal in order to get such objects from trav ellers, and the requests for them are always made with great fear and hesitation, and with instructions to turn over such articles quickly and surreptitiously, lest anyone—even a Jew—see that the objects were trans ferred. While there is no doubt that events in the Middle East have recently caused the Soviet attitude towards its Jewish inhabitants to be hardened— there are a number of incidents which have leaked out to the West recently indicating this hardening of approach towards Russian Jewry—it is of transcendent importance that visits by Jews of Western countries—especially by observant Jewish laymen—be made as frequently as possible. By their very presence, these visitors indicate hope to Soviet Jews and, most importantly, show that we care and have not for gotten our three million brothers. HE terrible and appalling conclu T sion I arrived at as a result of my trip is that by and large, except

NQvçmber-Deççmbçr l?67

for a few notable exceptions, half-acentury of Soviet oppression and re strictions against the Jews has taken an awful toll, in the U.S.S.R. During these fifty years, while Jews in West ern countries have said little and done less about the conditions of their besieged and beleaguered brethren, Soviet authorities have, in the main, succeeded in much of what they aimed for—the spiritual murder of the Jewish people. Certainly, pockets of resistance remain, determined to fight to the end to preserve their Jew ish heritage, no matter what. And I met such modern day spiritual des cendants of the Maccabees. Undoubtedly, too, the annual ren aissance of Jewish consciousness among Jew s. on Simchath Torah in large cities as reported widely in the press and by writers such as Elie Wiesel, offers some encouragement and hope, in the belief that these are manifestations of deep inner feeling and not just superficial happenings, unrelated and unreflective of the real, year-round feelings of these people towards Judaism and their Jewish heritage. However, although the appearance of 10,000 or 20,000 or even 30,000 Jews once a year in front of Mos cow’s Central synagogue out of halfa-million Moscow Jews does not represent, as some may conclude, the last shout of a dying remnant of a once proud heritage, neither does it signal a newborn renaissance of Rus sian Jewish youth as some would have us believe. At the same time, the bare facts of Soviet Jewry should not lead one to the inexorable conclusion that the inner resources and the self-

perpetuating dynamicism of Soviet Jewry as a whole | have just about been exhausted. The question of To Protest and Demonstrate or Not To Protest and Demonstrate has, by and large, be come more and more academic with each passing week, month, and year as the spiritual massacre of our peo ple becomes more and more an evi dent fact. With our brethren strain ing to cleave to that life whose last traces are steadily but surely being expunged from the Soviet Union, it behooves Am Yisroel to have that faith in the Ribono shel Olam which has been the hallmark of our people through the ages. Implied therein is the obligation upon every Jew the world over to express, through speech and action, his feelings about his brothers in the Soviet Union. For, while even in the totally un likely possibility that the Soviet Union should suddenly decide to reverse it s e l f to p e r m i t the e s t a b l i s h ment of synagogues, yeshivoth, schools, publications, organizations, and institutions tomorrow, one can scarcely visualize, sad to say, an im mediate reversal of the trend gen erated by the calculated, mostly suc cessful effort aimed at the spiritual destruction of Soviet Jewry. There is one hope, one remote possibility—

that the USSR will permit those of its Jewish residents who so desire to emigrate. Although admittedly the ArabIsraeli war made this possibility even more remote than heretofore, should the Soviet Union open its doors to its Jewish citizens, in spite of every thing, in response to the call of M i Vomì Haholchim, substantial num bers of Soviet Jews would opt for emigration and so respond if the op portunity arose. Towards this goal every Jewish organization and every committed Jew, wherever he may be, must bend every effort and must work to con vince others of the necessity to be deeply concerned, so that their gov ernments will apply appropriate measures and pressures upon the Soviet Government. Public protests and demonstrations must continue— and must be expanded. The Soviet government must see that the world cares. Our burden, for having sat quietly by during the past half-century and permitting the situation to reach the crisis it has without doing anything, is enormous. Will we ever be for given, if by our apathy we continue to allow Jews and Judaism to become totally extinct in the Soviet Union?

JEW ISH LIFE

B ooh R eview s The Gates Revisited By Jason Jacobowitz SHAAREI TESHUVAH—THE GATES OF REPENTANCE. By Rabbeynu Yonah ben Avraham of Gerona; English translation by Shraga Silverstein; Boys Town, Jerusalem: Yaakov Feldheim, 1967. 383 pp., $6.50.

e p e n t a n c e , though perhaps most

propitious during the Ten Days of Penitence, is applicable and desired all the year through. Similarly “Thè Gates of Repentance” by Rabbeynu Yonah, though keyed towards the Days of Re pentance, is a book to be read and re read, studied and restudied throughout the entire year. This is a masterful work by a Rishon of the 13th century and its scope, its vistas, and its teachings are spatial. Rabbeynu Yonah ben Avraham, re ferred to as He-Chosid and the Elder, R abbi Jacobowitz is

Assistant Registrar o f

Yeshiva University.

November-December 1967

was born in Gerona and died in Toledo, Spain, in the year 1263. He was one of the most prominent students of Rabbi Solomon of Montpellier, the leader of the opponents of Maimonides’ philo sophical works. Rabbeynu Yonah was one of the signers of the ban proclaimed in 1233 against the “Guide to the Per plexed” and “The Book of Knowledge” (Sefer Ha-Madda) of the Mishneh Torah by Maimonides. According to some, Rabbeynu Yonah was one of those who advocated the burning of these books, a deed which finally came to pass in Paris in the same year as the ban. Unfortunately, much to his chagrin and dismay, this burning was followed nine years later by the burning in that same city of 24 wagon loads of the Talmud. He then publicly admitted in the synagogue in Montpellier that he was in error in his acts against the works and fame of Maimonides. He 59

vowed to travel to Palestine to bow down at the grave of Maimonides and ask forgiveness. However, he was de tained, and remained in Toledo where he became one of the great Talmudical teachers and scholars of his time. In his lectures, he quoted Maimonides by name, with great reverence. His death came suddenly, and some said this was in retribution for not having fulfilled his vow of going to the grave of Maimonides. Rabbeynu Yonah was so emotionally stimulated by the entire episode that he wrote the Shaarey Teshuvah and other works on repentance as atonement for himself, at the same time bringing to gether the communities and factions in volved in the schism. He endeavored to soothe frayed feelings while showing and clearly verbalizing the goals of life and the ideals of mankind according to our Torah and our Sages. Shraga Silverstein, who translated Mesillat Yesharim by Rabbi Moshe Luzzatto, has rendered Shaarey Teshu vah into its first English rendition. In his brief introduction, he quotes a lam entation composed by the Ramban for his cousin, Rabbeynu Yonah. The esteem held by the Ramban is addition ally obvious in that his daughter’s child was named Yonah. The Ramban en deavored to protect the name of his cousin when supporters of Maimonides spread a vicious rumor that questioned the legitimacy of Rabbeynu Yonah and his family on the grounds of a sup posedly invalid “get.” In “The Gates of Repentance,” chapter 208, this attack is referred to: “Slander is compared to an arrow in yet a different respect. If the pity of one who draws his sword towards his intended victim is aroused by the latter’s begging mercy of him, he can yet return his sword to its sheath. Not so one who releases an arrow, for

it cannot be called back. So it is with the slanderer: once the words have left his mouth, he cannot correct them. And sometimes he might speak of a stain in one’s family, and injure all of the gen erations which follow so that forgive ness will be rendered impossible. This is the reason for the statement of our Sages, of blessed memory, that one who speaks of a family taint can never gain repentance.” Similarly, but briefer, on page 221, we find: “Our Sages, of blessed memory, have said that one who spreads an evil report that casts asper sions on another’s ancestry remains for ever without atonement . . .” “The Gates of Repentance” is a “little” book, containing 383 pages— actually 191 in Hebrew and the re mainder in English. The sefer is divided into four “gates,” or divisions, the first entitled “Concerning the Principles of Repentance” and containing 52 “chap ters.” These are actually paragraphs, elaborations within the main subject. In this section are given 20 Principles of Repentance: regret, forsaking sin, sor row, worry and so on to the twentieth, which to “to turn as many as possible from transgression.” The section ends with a list of twenty-four deterrents to repentance. The second gate is entitled “To Teach the Ways by Which One May Awaken Himself to Return to G-d,” the concretization of the theoretical aspects of the first gate. Here are contained 34 chapters or paragraphs. As indicated above, here, too, these range from three lines to two pages each. Again, the author resorts to the numbering process: as he counts 20 principles of repentance, for example, so does he enumerate six motivations to repentance. n p H E third gate is the major one as X therein is contained the major portion JEW ISH LIFE

of the book. It is entitled “The Stringen cy of Mitzvoth, The Exhortations, and the Different Kinds of Punishments.” It consists of 231 chapters, filling 114 of the 191 pages, containing detailed de scriptions and portrayals of positive mitzvoth, stressing the fallability of the thought that there is no punishment for the neglect of observing positive com mandments. On page 145, the author indicates that the Torah sets forth pun ishment for the non-observance of a mitzvah, as it is said: “Cursed be he that confirmeth not the words of this law to do them” (Deuteronomy 27, 26). “To do them” reflects that non-perform ance of a positive commandment is be ing spoken of. And on page 147: “And although the mitzvah of Tzitzith de volves only upon one who has a fourcornered garment, there being no re quirement that he buy such a garment if he lacks one, still our Sages, of blessed memory, have said that one will be punished in times of trouble because of his not having desired the beauty and the reward of the mitzvah enough to make himself responsible for its per formance by acquiring a garment with four corners and fitting them out with tzitzith.” Rabbeynu Yonah summarizes this section of positive mitzvoth, as he irregularly does after various sections: “We have brought here together many of the mitzvoth in which many people of this generation are remiss. This work offers a basis for each of them. Take them to yourself upon the tablet of your heart.” This exhortation applies to us likewise today. An entire section in this third gate is devoted to “exhortation involving the closing of one’s hand and the abstention from action.” On page 191 is the follow ing: “It is highly desirable that there be in every city a group of volunteers from among the enlightened who are November-December 1967

prepared and ready for any situation in which a man or woman of Israel must be rescued from distress.” With regard to the command of re buking one’s neighbor, the author sug gests: (page 193) “To escape punish ment for this sin (failure to rebuke);it is fitting to select men of truth and recruit men of valor from among the populace as chief overseers Of every market place and living area in their neighborhoods, to look to their neigh bors, rebuke them for every offense and eradicate the evil.” One wonders how this type of overseeing could ever have taken place. This is forbidden territory for even most professional rabbis in our day. For those who question the advis ability or even legality of vows for charity, Rabbeynu Yonah states: “Vows are appropriate for the purpose of strengthening those who are weak.” He discusses the “negative commandments involving an action”: “For there are many exhortations which, though ob served in part, are in part abused, such as the prohibition against work on Sabbath. . . . Similarly everyone is heed ful in respect to the life blood of an animal, and to the blood remaining in the veins, but some are not careful in the salting process to properly rid the meat of its blood. There are many in stances where there is no knowledge and no rebuke. . . In our day, this salting process has become forgotten or unknown to many who place complete reliance on the butcher. Of historical interest and surprise is the statement on page 197: “Many transgress these negative commandments (against injuring or striking) in the striking of their wives.” Also of inter est is the statement found on page 207: “It would be well to stir up resentment to reprove those oppressors among our 61

people in some places who put the debtor in chains, even when he is in no position to pay.” There are ten levels of punishment discussed with regard to mitzvoth, the tenth being those trespassers who have no share in the world to come. The final section of the third gate is “An Exposition of the Nature of the Trans gressors of the ‘Four Classes,’ ” being those who are punishable by the four deaths decreeable by the courts. This section is also replete with numbers: five categories of levity, nine categories of liars, nine categories of flatterers, and six categories of slanderers. The fourth and concluding gate is a very brief one consisting of 22 chapters, dealing with the “Divisions of Atone ment.” In this last gate, Rabbeynu Yonah gives three reasons for feasting on the day prior to the Day of Atone ment (pages 361-363): “In this regard, our Sages, of blessed memory, said: ‘If one sets a repast for the eve of the Day of Atonement, it is as if he were commanded to fast upon the ninth and tenth days and did so’ (Rosh Hashana 9a), for he thereby shows his joy at the arrival of the period of his atone ment, and this serves as testimony to his worry over his guilt and his sorrow over his transgressions. Also, on the other festivals we set a repast for the joy of the mitzvah, for great and ex alted is the reward for joy over mitz voth . . . Because the Day of Atone ment is a fast-day, we are required to set a repast of joy of the mitzvah on its eve. Again, (thirdly) to strengthen ourselves to multiply prayer and sup plication on the Day of Atonement, and to take counsel with ourselves concern ing repentance and its essentials.” This book contains no index, and in reality none is needed. The table of

contents, listing and labeling each of the 339 chapters, gives one* easy refer ence to each subject and area, and its length of fourteen pages indicates its total inclusiveness. At the end is the “Foundation of Repentance,” a six-page epistle on Teshuvah in its original Hebrew only, by the same author. The translation of “The Gates of Repentance” is very smooth-reading and faithful. Sources are given for most quotes, though not all, and interestingly, in many places, a source is given in the Hebrew text but not in the English, and vice-versa. The Hebrew is vowelled, and the English is on the opposite page, a combination which facilitates the read er’s moving from the Hebrew to the English and back again. The book is a veritable thesaurus of quotes from Tanach, Talmud and Mid rash. An index of sources would be helpful for further study for comparing commentaries or for exegesis. Many similies and aphorisms are used, and of note is that all are culled from the resources of Midrash and Talmud. Halochah, too, is very much in evidence. To cite but one example (page 215): “But carrying for everyday purposes (on a festival) is forbidden. Only such carrying as is required for the festival is permitted.” Rashi’s opinion is that one may carry “Afilo shelo lezorach kelal”—even for no purpose. The Tal mudic scholar thus can find many areas of Halachic interest in addition to the main theme of repentance. One can read “The Gates of Repent ance” for its obvious message, one can study it for Halochah, for its exegesis, and one can compare it to Maimonides and to the commentaries of Rabbeynu Yonah on Proverbs, on Aboth and on Berachoth. I endeavored to make some of the above comparisons. Many of the JfWISH LIFE

comments in Proverbs are the same in thought though not necessarily in lan guage as in “Gates of Repentance.” In fact, the editor of the footnotes to the edition of the commentary on Proverbs published by Pardes, Israel, lists many parallel comments in “The Gates of Repentance.” The manuscript from which that volume was published, how ever, covers only 24 chapters. Com ments on Proverbs in “The Gates of Repentance” after the 24th chapter or on sections not covered can be invalu able additions to that commentary. The one on Aboth contains similarities to the comments in our book but not as close in thought as the comparison to that on Proverbs. There seemed to be no connection to the few references in Berachoth. This may be because the author did not himself write the com mentary to Berachoth, rather his stu dents compiled it after his death. In comparison to Maimonides’ Laws of Repentance, one sees striking simi larities between Gates I, II and IV to Chapters I, II, IV and VI in Maimon ides. Missing, noticeably, in “The Gates of Repentance” are those chapters or

November-December l?$7

sections in Maimonides dealing with ideas of philosophy and speculation. Rabbeynu Yonah is found in Tosofos in the Talmud in Tractates Shabbos, Moed Koton and Nedarim. In two of these places we find after his name the epithet ^"1, “Noam Eden” (possibly “Noach Eden”). As can be seen from this sefer and from other known works, he was respected as a Hasid, a saint, a genius for knowledge and organiza tion, insightful, even charismatic. This particular work is an exciting, motivat ing and inspiring one and its present format and translation is a welcome addition to our books on ethics. I conclude this review with a quote from the Second Gate, the fourth means —learning Torah—“by which one may awaken himself and return to G-d”: “When one learns G-d’s Torah and reads the words of the Prophets and the Writing, and understands the pleas antness of instruction, and sees the ex hortations and the punishments, he should tremble and set his heart to im prove his ways and deeds so as to find favor in the eyes of G-d. . . .” This book helps one achieve this goal.

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M odern History, Early Chapter By Louis Bernstein THE POPES AND THE JEWS IN THE MIDDLE AGES. By Edward A. Syrian. New York: The Macmillan Com pany, 1965, 246 pp. $5.95. f 1 1HE most significant fact about this JL scholarly volume is that it was written. A generation ago, it would have been inconceivable that a Catholic priest should write a defense of the papacy for persecuting Jews and Juda ism. The agony of World War II blotted out previous inhumane treatment of the Jew. But the Christian world has been forced to come to grips with its pernici ous treatment of Jews during the Nazi era and as part of its soul searching it now reaches to the deeper roots planted in the soil of history. Let us not, however, believe the pur pose of the book, progressive as it may be for a church scholar, is either pen ance or objective scholarship. This is one of a series of quest books sponsored by the Institute of Judaeo-Christian Studies of Seton Hall University. The preface is by John M. Oesterreicher, the ranking meshumad in the American Catholic clergy. A historian dealing with Jewish relationships must surely know that a convert is regarded with contempt and suspicion by the Jew. The meshumad who becomes an active agent for another faith has no credence and reveals the missionary purpose of the project he is promoting. Whereas the apostates Pablo Christiani and Nicholas Donin attempted to seduce Jews by attacking Judaism, their R abbi B ernstein is spiritual leader of the Young Israel of Windsor Park in Bayside, New York.

November-December 1967

modern counterparts assume an opposite pose. Although Synan does list repres sive papal measures against Jews, he naturally emphasizes the favorable acts by the popes of the Middle Ages. As a rule the best were prototypes of “The Deputy” for few, if any, took active measures to grant the Jew dignity. YNAN attempts to justify some of S the crudest and crudest acts of the popes as being viewed out of the con text of their times. For example, re marking that Alexander VI extended the course of a footrace by which Jews were obliged to run in the annual Ro man carnival “in order to prolong the spectacle and his enjoyment of it,” Synan says: “Modern authors have seen in this annual event an undignified and humiliating exhibition, as indeed it may have been, but is it certain that it seem ed so to the Jews of Renaissance Rome?” Some Jews then may have felt that subjection to this spectacle was a small price to pay for physical survival and were content to play along. But in every Roman Jew’s heart there must have been disdain for the faith that could deify such a vulgar man as its supreme spiritual leader as well as com passion for its adherents. Father Synan must receive an A for effort. But the past can not be inter preted away. For this reviewer, the Christianis, Seniors, and Donins and their entire eras of expulsions, persecu tions, and book burnings are resur rected when he sees the name Oesterreicher. 65

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JEWISH LIFE

Again, A Spotlight By Gilbert Klaperman JEWISH IDENTITY ON THE SUB URBAN FRONTIER: A Study of Group Survival in the Open Society. By Marshall Sklare and Joseph Greenbaum. New York: Basic Books, 1967, 362 pp., $11.50. T the end of World War II the Jewish community in the United States underwent what has been popu larly characterized as “a religious re vival.” Synagogues showed enlarged membership lists, and so many new houses of worship were built that the term “edifice complex” became a com mon phrase in our speech. This in creased involvement with Judaism came in part as a result of the terrible Euro pean holocaust which intensified the in terest of the committed and developed Jewish loyalties in the otherwise uncom mitted. These latter returned to par ticipate in Judaism because of a number of emotions that are complex in their interrelationship. First they came out of a sense of guilt, either because they survived while their brethren perished or because they had not done more for European Jewry in its hour of peril. This sense of guilt, combined with a renewed awareness of their inextricable relationship with the historic continuity of Judaism, has been translated by many into a determination to preserve that very quality of Judaism that had singled out Jews for destruction. The religious revival was also stimulated by the upsurge in Jewish pride that fol-

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November-December 1967

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lowed upon the establishment of the State of Israel and its successful defense against Arab attack in the very first days of its existence. The American Jew who wanted to identify with the new Jewish image created by the State of Israel, in addition to supporting it financially and otherwise, could most easily do so by joining a synagogue, the most widely accepted symbol of Jews and Judaism in this country. Although we understand its causes, the essential nature of this revival, while gratifying in and of itself, has not yet been completely explored. Does it pre sage a true return to Judaism in terms of piety, religious fervor, and adherence to traditional principles of faith? Or is it a superficial relationship based on other factors such as ethnic, cultural, and social fulfillments that are found within the Synagogue walls and in its membership benefits? Inquiry in this area is further ob scured by the large movement of Jews into the suburban peripheries of the large metropolitan areas where social and psychological pressures make reli gious affiliation imperative. Life in sub urbia is less anonymous than in the large city housing complexes. As a re sult, there are more frequent and per sonal confrontations and more involved relationships between neighbors, which contribute to a more demanding realiza tion of the need for self identification on many levels including self-definition in religious terms. Secondly, as has al ready been indicated by Nathan Glazer, in the suburbs the Jew is placed vis-a-vis his non-Jewish neighbor, in the position 67

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JEWISH LIFE

where he finds it desirable to identify with his religious groupings. Often it is the Jewish suburbanite’s children, seeking equal status with their Gentile friends for whom Church and religious school attendance take priority, who spur their parents on to greater interest in the Synagogue. Moreover, the sub urban climate, which emphasizes the structured existence of the “three major faiths,” requires the Jew to identify with the Synagogue. If belonging to a Synagogue or even building a new one signifies more social and communal necessity rather than religious fidelity, we may legitimately inquire: how much of the religious re vival is religious, or, what religious meaning is there in the revival? In short, how does the Jew react to his own faith? Jew’s relationship to his faith, the exAn analysis of this problem—the tent of his religious practice, the mean ing of his identification as well as the conflicting feelings that he has about his sectarian apartness and his efforts to achieve complete integration in the general society—has recently been com pleted under the sponsorship of the American Jewish Committee. The re sult of the study has appeared in two volumes. The first volume is the sub ject of this review. The second volume, “The Edge of Friendliness: A Study of Jewish-Gentile Relations” by Benjamin B. Ringer, examines the reactions of Gentiles and Jews to each other. To gether the two books make up the Lakeville Studies—findings based on in terviews with hundreds of Jews and Christians over a period of five years in a large mid-western suburb that has been given the cover name “Lakeville.” Lakeville is a typical prosperous sub urban community of about 25,000 population, of whom approximately one November-December 1967

third are Jewish. 92% of the Jews of Lakeville are native Americans, the rest are natives of eastern Europe and refu gees from Nazism in Germany and Austria. The native Jews are predomin antly second and third generations Americans, with a smaller group repre senting the fourth generation. Because the Jews of Lakeville are in a fairly advanced stage of remoteness from their immigrant antecedents, the study is important not only for what it reveals about them, but also in that it might serve as a projection of the picture of the American Jewish community as a whole in the not too distant future. We might add, a very sad one at that. STUDY confirms a number of S HE disturbing anomalies current among Jews in general today. For example, the typical subject considered himself a “good Jew,” possessed a strong desire to survive as a Jew, hoped his children would continue as such, and felt “more at home” with other Jews; only 8% claimed that a majority of their friends were Gentile, yet only 23% considered marrying within the Jewish faith as vital. Only 21% considered support for Israel as vital. And 67% considered it essential to contribute to all humani tarian causes while only 21% consid ered it essential to contribute to Jewish philanthropies. Apparently, being a “good Jew” did not involve identifica tion with particularly Jewish causes. Similarly confusing is the definition of Judaism offered by the respondents who considered themselves “good Jews.” In his daily life the typical “good Jew” practised few of the traditional laws and customs of Judaism; 86% consid ered the observance of Kashruth unim portant. And, although there are five houses of worship in Lakeville, four 69

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JEWISH LIFE

Reform and one Conservative (an effort to organize an orthodox Synagogue died in its inception) in which 83% of the Jewish families are past or present mem bers, religious piety is not considered a major prerequisite for being a “good Jew,” Only 24% of, those interviewed felt that attendance at Synagogue serv ices evenpduring the Holy Days was required. (Italics mine) This profile of the typical “good Jew” of Lakeville is far removed from that of the “guter Yid” of our forefather’s day. It confirms the disquieting observa tion that Jews have altered substantially the traditional concept of Judaism wherein all aspects of the human exist ence and all duties of the Jew are inter woven into the integrated system of his life and beliefs. For our people, ritual observance and interpersonal relation ships were and are validated by the same authority and their fulfillment is binding in equal strength. The defini tion of Judaism was always determined by the Torah as a logical precedent to the existence of the Jewish people it self. And Jews were such only to the extent that they accepted the Torah. In brief, it was Judaism that defined the Jewish people and not the Jewish people that defined Judaism. In Lakeville it has been demonstrated that Jews are able to think of themselves as Jews without serious reference to the theological, ritual, and faith requirements that al ways were, and, for orthodox Jews are, the very centrality and totality of the Jewish definition. Instead, the Jews of Lakeville are conforming their Judaism to the dominant Christian and secular environment in which they live. For this reason they have diminished the im portance of practical observance and in creased the equation of their faith with ethical behavior. They restrict their ritual practices to those “that demand November-December 1967

minimal separation or deviation from the general community,” or that have family “social” value. Thus the Pesach Seder and the lighting of the Chanukah candles are their most popular holiday observances. The modern Lakeville Jew, contrary to the One-time honored view that “be ing a good Jew makes you a good per son,” believes that “being a good person makes you a good Jew.” Some 93% of those interviewed felt that in order to qualify as a “good Jew,” one must “lead an ethical and moral life.” HAT has emerged from the study is that a form of evolutionary sur W vival of the fittest of religious principles is taking place in Lakeville and “each successive generation . . . is reared in an increasingly more restricted pattern of home observance and Synagogue at tendance.” Lakeville Jews are in the process of constructing their own Jew ish values, based on their own assess ment of the validity of our hallowed traditions, on their need for adjustment to the overwhelmingly Christian climate in which they live and their desire to be accepted as good Americans. These selective criteria constitute what the Lakeville Jew feels it is “objectively possible for him to practice and sub jectively possible for him to identify with.” Such standards for religious liv ing negate the transcendant nature of Torah Judaism and the Divine will in Which Jews have believed throughout the centuries. Should the trend continue, American Jewry is doomed to extinc tion as a religion. Fortunately, Lakeville’s religious pro file does not reflect the true future of American Jewry, for it does not take into account the orthodox Jew and his progressively developing importance and impact in America. Sociologist Charles 71

S. Liebman in a perceptive survey of Orthodoxy in American Jewish Life has pointed out that “Orthodoxy is on the upsurge. Its inner core is growing in numbers and financial strengths” The Lakeville community, when it became the subject of this study, had already formed a basically non-traditional orientation and lacked all the facilities and the climate for a viable orthodox community. There is no evi dence of the presence of intensely orthodox Jews among the later settlers of Lakeville and certainly none among the earlier. Building an orthodox Syna gogue was twice attempted by one man who himself would not qualify as “very” orthodox and both efforts failed because there was no support forthcoming from the community. Lakeville may, there fore, be considered as much a “closed” non-orthodox community as New Square and the Chassidic enclaves in Williams burg and other sections of New York City are “closed” orthodox communi ties. In these, Judaism is a subject of passion, alive and vital, constantly build ing new services for religious fulfill ment and always strengthening the walls which make it secure. From these cen ters of positive Torah living, the rate of defection seems to be much less, and the defectors substantially replaced through reverse currents that run towards increased practice. This is found in the non-Chassidic sector of Ortho doxy as well, where Yeshiva University and Stern College for Women exercise areas of influence, for example. “Jewish Identity on the Suburban Frontier” is a well documented, impar tial study that conveys a number of im portant conclusions: First and fore most, we cannot take the positive need for Jewish identity for granted. From the Lakeville study we see conclusively that where there are no facilities for 72

orthodox religious living, religious ad herence suffers. We learn too that Jews in the Lakevilles, like their Christian counterparts, are devaluating the im portance of ritual. Such Jews, especially because of their search for acceptance into the American culture, are ready to yield many of their religious prac tices. Therefore, orthodox Jews must feel their mission strongly, to keep alive strong education centers, to maintain contact with the general Jewish com munity, and to pioneer in communities where their strength and background are much needed. The “shlicbim” of Lubavitch with their missionary zeal are such a positive force, as is, so notably, the National Conference of Synagogue Youth of the Union of Orthodox Jewish Congregations of America. The Student Struggle for Soviet Jewry and the Yavneh movement on the college campuses, both led by orthodox Jewish youth, are further examples of such dynamic growth movements. On the positive side, the study demon strated that the fabric of American life which recognizes Judaism as one of the three major faiths, encourages Jews to identify with their religious institutions. It is also demonstrated that the extent of observance in the parental home has an important effect on the child. Even in Lakeville there is a higher rate of religious observance among those who experienced greater observance in their parent’s home. Orthodoxy can build on the pheno menon of growing identification with the Synagogue by developing more specific and energetic techniques where by to reach into the Lakevilles of the United States. It should also use the powerful force of religious education to set the foundation for the adherence of the coming generations. JEW ISH LIFE

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